Every closed, oriented, real analytic Riemannian 3-manifold can be isometrically embedded as a special Lagrangian submanifold of a Calabi-Yau 3-fold, even as the real locus of an antiholomorphic, isometric involution. Every closed, oriented, real analytic Riemannian 4-manifold whose bundle of self-dual 2-forms is trivial can be isometrically embedded as a coassociative submanifold in a G_2-manifold, even as the fixed locus of an anti-G_2 involution.
These results, when coupled with McLean's analysis of the moduli spaces of such calibrated submanifolds, yield a plentiful supply of examples of compact calibrated submanifolds with nontrivial deformation spaces.
Coassociative submanifolds are 4-dimensional calibrated submanifolds in $G_{2}$-manifolds. In this paper, we construct explicit examples of coassociative submanifolds in $Λ^{2}_{-} S^{4}$, which is the complete $G_{2}$-manifold constructed by Bryant and Salamon. Classifying the Lie groups which have 3- or 4-dimensional orbits, we show that the only homogeneous coassociative submanifold is the zero section of $Λ^{2}_{-} S^{4}$ up to the automorphisms and construct many cohomogeneity one examples explicitly. In particular, we obtain examples of non-compact coassociative submanifolds with conical…
We study the natural structure on the moduli space of deformations of compact coassociative submanifolds. We show that a G2-manifold with a T^4-action of isomorphisms such that the orbits are coassociative tori is locally equivalent to a minimal 3-manifold in R^{3,3} = H^2(T^4,R) with positive induced metric. By studying minimal surfaces in quadrics we show how to construct minimal 3-manifold cones in R^{3,3} and hence G2-metrics from equations similar to a set of affine Toda equations. The relation to semi-flat special Lagrangian fibrations and the Monge-Ampère equation are explained.
Coassociative 4-folds are a particular class of 4-dimensional submanifolds which are defined in a 7-dimensional manifold M with a G_2 structure given by a `positive' differential 3-form, sometimes called G_2-form. Assuming that a G_2-form on M is closed, we study deformations of a compact coassociative submanifold N with boundary contained in fixed, codimension 1 submanifold S of M with a compatible Hermitian symplectic structure. We show that `small' coassociative deformations of N with special Lagrangian boundary in S are unobstructed and form a smooth moduli space of finite dimension not gr…
We study the problem of counting instantons with coassociative boundary condition in (almost) G_(2)-manifolds. This is analog to the open Gromov-Witten theory for counting holomorphic curves with Lagrangian boundary condition in Calabi-Yau manifolds. We explain its relationship with the Seiberg-Witten invariants for coassociative submanifolds.
In this paper we investigate the geometry of Calibrated submanifolds and study relations between their moduli-space and geometry of the ambient manifold. In particular for a Calabi-Yau manifold we define Special Lagrangian submanifolds for any Kahler metric on it. We show that for a choice of Kahler metric the Borcea-Voisin threefold has a fibration structure with generic fiber being a Special Lagrangian torus. Moreover we construct a mirror to this fibration. Also for any closed G_2 form on a 7-manifold we study coassociative submanifolds and we show that one example of a G_2 manifold constru…
In an earlier paper, we proved that given an asymptotically cylindrical G_2-manifold M with a Calabi-Yau boundary X, the moduli space of coassociative deformations of an asymptotically cylindrical coassociative 4-fold C in M with a fixed special Lagrangian boundary L in X is a smooth manifold of dimension dim(V_+), where V_+ is the positive subspace of the image of H^2_{cs}(C,R) in H^2(C,R). In order to prove this we used the powerful tools of Fredholm Theory for noncompact manifolds which was developed by Lockhart and McOwen, and independently by Melrose. In this paper, we extend our result t…
We construct calibrated submanifolds of R^7 and R^8 by viewing them as total spaces of vector bundles and taking appropriate sub-bundles which are naturally defined using certain surfaces in R^4. We construct examples of associative and coassociative submanifolds of R^7 and of Cayley submanifolds of R^8. This construction is a generalization of the Harvey-Lawson bundle construction of special Lagrangian submanifolds of R^{2n}.
The principal theory of this paper comprises a technique for constructing associative, coassociative and Cayley submanifolds of Euclidean space with symmetries, using first-order ordinary differential equations. Explicit examples of U(1)-invariant associative cones in R^7 and SU(2)-invariant Cayley 4-folds in R^8 are then produced using this method. Further examples of associative 3-folds are presented, which are ruled, and other systems of differential equations defining calibrated submanifolds in R^7 and R^8 are given.
We show the total space of the canonical line bundle $\mathbb{L}$ of a Kahler-Einstein manifold $X^n$ supports integrable $SU(n+1)$ structures, or Calabi-Yau structures. The canonical real line bundle $L \subset \mathbb{L}$ over a minimal Lagrangian submanifold $M \subset X$ is calibrated in this setting and hence can be considered as the special Lagrangian lift of $M$. For the integrable $G_2$ and $Spin(7)$ structures on spin bundles and bundles of anti-self-dual 2-forms on self-dual Einstein 4-manifolds constructed by Bryant and Salamon, minimal surfaces with vanishing complex quartic form (…
While the study of bordered (pseudo-)holomorphic curves with boundary on Lagrangian submanifolds has a long history, a similar problem that involves (special) Lagrangian submanifolds with boundary on complex surfaces appears to be largely overlooked in both physics and math literature. We relate this problem to geometry of coassociative submanifolds in $G_2$ holonomy spaces and to $Spin(7)$ metrics on 8-manifolds with $T^2$ fibrations. As an application to physics, we propose a large class of brane models in type IIA string theory that generalize brane brick models on the one hand and 2d theor…
We construct a compact formal 7-manifold with a closed $G_2$-structure and with first Betti number $b_1=1$, which does not admit any torsion-free $G_2$-structure, that is, it does not admit any $G_2$-structure such that the holonomy group of the associated metric is a subgroup of $G_2$. We also construct associative calibrated (hence volume-minimizing) 3-tori with respect to this closed $G_2$-structure and, for each of those 3-tori, we show a 3-dimensional family of non-trivial associative deformations. We also construct a fibration of our 7-manifold over $S^2\times S^1$ with generic fiber a (…
This paper is a continuation of math.DG/0408005. We first construct special Lagrangian submanifolds of the Ricci-flat Stenzel metric (of holonomy SU(n)) on the cotangent bundle of S^n by looking at the conormal bundle of appropriate submanifolds of S^n. We find that the condition for the conormal bundle to be special Lagrangian is the same as that discovered by Harvey-Lawson for submanifolds in R^n in their pioneering paper. We also construct calibrated submanifolds in complete metrics with special holonomy G_2 and Spin(7) discovered by Bryant and Salamon on the total spaces of appropriate bun…
The exceptional holonomy groups are G2 in 7 dimensions, and Spin(7) in 8 dimensions. Riemannian manifolds with these holonomy groups are Ricci-flat. This is a survey paper on exceptional holonomy, in two parts. Part I introduces the exceptional holonomy groups, and explains constructions for compact 7- and 8-manifolds with holonomy G2 and Spin(7). The simplest such constructions work by using techniques from complex geometry and Calabi-Yau analysis to resolve the singularities of a torus orbifold T^7/G or T^8/G, for G a finite group preserving a flat G2 or Spin(7)-structure on T^7 or T^8. Ther…
In this paper we will investigate torus actions on complete manifolds with calibrations. For Calabi-Yau manifolds M^2n with a Hamiltonian structure-preserving k-torus action we show that any symplectic reduction has a natural holomorphic volume form. Moreover Special Lagrangian (SLag) submanifolds of the reduction lift to SLag submanifolds of M, invariant under the torus action. If k=n-1 and the first cohomology of M is trivial, then we prove that M is a fibration with generic fiber being a SLag submanifold. As an application we will see that crepant resolutions of singularities of a finite Ab…
Lagrangian submanifolds in strict nearly Kähler 6-manifolds are related to special Lagrangian submanifolds in Calabi-Yau 6-manifolds and coassociative cones in $G_2$-manifolds. We prove that the mean curvature of a Lagrangian submanifold $L$ in a nearly Kähler manifold $(M^{2n}, J, g)$ is symplectically dual to the Maslov 1-form on $L$. Using relative calibrations, we derive a formula for the second variation of the volume of a Lagrangian submanifold $L^3$ in a strict nearly Kähler manifold $(M^6, J, g)$. This formula implies, in particular, that any formal infinitesimal Lagrangian deformation…
In this paper, we derive a mean curvature estimate for eternal solutions (including translating solutions) of almost-calibrated Lagrangian mean curvature flow in complex Euclidean space. As a consequence, we show a non-existence result for eternal solutions of almost-calibrated Lagrangian mean curvature flow.
We find calibrated submanifolds in neck manifolds. Particularly, we obtain a calibrated submanifold in the Lagrangian self-expander constructed by Joyce, Lee and Tsui.
In this paper we study the geometry of manifolds with vector cross product and its complexification. First we develop the theory of instantons and branes and study their deformations. For example they are (i) holomorphic curves and Lagrangian submanifolds in symplectic manifolds and (ii) associative submanifolds and coassociative submanifolds in G_2-manifolds. Second we classify Kahler manifolds with the complex analog of vector cross product, namely they are Calabi-Yau manifolds and hyperkahler manifolds. Furthermore we study instantons, Neumann branes and Dirichlet branes on these manifolds.…
Ancient solutions of Lagrangian mean curvature flow in C^n naturally arise as Type II blow-ups. In this extended note we give structural and classification results for such ancient solutions in terms of their blow-down and, motivated by the Thomas-Yau Conjecture, focus on the almost calibrated case. In particular, we classify Type II blow-ups of almost calibrated Lagrangian mean curvature flow when the blow-down is a pair of transverse planes or, when n=2, a multiplicity two plane. We also show that the Harvey-Lawson Clifford torus cone in C^3 cannot arise as the blow-down of an almost calibra…
`Gluing' is a technique of constructing solutions to non-linear (elliptic) partial differential equations such as Yang--Mills equations, minimal surface equations and Einstein equations. Calibrated submanifolds are a certain class of minimal surfaces, and there are various examples of them constructed by the gluing technique. We have existence theorems in that sense, but there seems to have been no uniqueness theory for higher-dimensional ones such as special Lagrangian submanifolds, which we discuss in the present paper.
In this paper, we show that the calibrated method can also be used to detect indefinite minimal Lagrangian submanifolds in $C_k^m$. We introduce the notion of indefinite special Lagrangian submanifolds in $C_k^m$ and generalize the well-known work of Harvey-Lawson to the indefinite case.
In this paper we introduce the area of 2-ruled 4-folds in R^n (n=7 or 8), that is, submanifolds M of R^n that admit a fibration over some 2-fold Sigma such that each fibre is an affine 2-plane in R^n. This is motivated by the paper math.DG/0012060 by Joyce on ruled special Lagrangian 3-folds in C^3 and the work of the author in math.DG/0401123 on ruled associative 3-folds in R^7. We say that a 2-ruled 4-fold M is r-framed if we are given an oriented basis for each fibre in a smooth manner, and in such circumstances we may write M in terms of orthogonal smooth maps phi_1,phi_2:Sigma-->S^(n-1) a…
We extend the "bundle constructions" of calibrated submanifolds, due to Harvey--Lawson in the special Lagrangian case, and to Ionel--Karigiannis--Min-Oo in the cases of exceptional calibrations, by "twisting" the bundles by a special (harmonic, holomorphic, parallel) section of a complementary bundle. The existence of such deformations shows that the moduli space of calibrated deformations of these "calibrated subbundles" includes deformations which destroy the linear structure of the fibre.
The aim of this paper is to study variational properties for $f$-minimal Lagrangian submanifolds in Kähler manifolds with real holomorphy potentials. Examples of submanifolds of this kind incuding soliton solutions for Lagrangian mean curvature flow (LMCF). We derive second variation formula for $f$-minimal Lagrangians as a generalization of Chen and Oh's formula for minimal Lagrangians. As a corollary, we obtain stability of expanding and translating solitons for LMCF. We also define calibrated submanifolds with respect to $f$-volume in gradient steady Kähler--Ricci solitons as generalization…
In this article we study the tangent cones at first time singularity of a Lagrangian mean curvature flow. If the initial compact submanifold is Lagrangian and almost calibrated by ReΩin a Calabi-Yau n-fold (M,Ω), and T>0 is the first blow-up time of the mean curvature flow, then the tangent cone of the mean curvature flow at a singular point (X,T) is a stationary Lagrangian integer multiplicity current in R\sup 2n with volume density greater than one at X. When n=2, the tangent cone consists of a finite union of more than one 2-planes in R\sup 4 which are complex in a complex structure on R\su…
Let H be the hyperbolic space of dimension n+1. A geodesic foliation of H is given by a smooth unit vector field on H all of whose integral curves are geodesics. Each geodesic foliation of H determines an n-dimensional submanifold M of the 2n-dimensional manifold L of all the oriented geodesics of H (up to orientation preserving reparametrizations). The space L has a canonical split semi-Riemannian metric induced by the Killing form of the isometry group of H. Using a split special Lagrangian calibration, we study the volume maximization problem for a certain class of geometrically distinguish…
Special Lagrangian submanifolds are submanifolds of a Calabi-Yau manifold calibrated by the real part of the holomorphic volume form. In this paper we use elliptic theory for edge-degenerate differential operators on singular manifolds to study the moduli space of deformations of special Lagrangian submanifolds with edge singularities. We obtain a general theorem describing the local structure of the moduli space. When the obstruction space vanishes the moduli space is a smooth, finite dimensional manifold.
In this paper, we prove various results on the topology of the Grassmannian of oriented 3-planes in Euclidean 6-space and compute its cohomology ring. We give self-contained proofs. These spaces come up when studying submanifolds of manifolds with calibrated geometries. We collect these results here for the sake of completeness. As applications of our algebraic topological study we present some results on special Lagrangian-free embeddings of surfaces and 3-manifolds into the Euclidean 4 and 6-space.
We show that the properties of Lagrangian mean curvature flow are a special case of a more general phenomenon, concerning couplings between geometric flows of the ambient space and of totally real submanifolds. Both flows are driven by ambient Ricci curvature or, in the non-Kähler case, by its analogues. To this end we explore the geometry of totally real submanifolds, defining (i) a new geometric flow in terms of the ambient canonical bundle, (ii) a modified volume functional which takes into account the totally real condition. We discuss short-time existence for our flow and show it couples …
A hypercomplex manifold is a manifold equipped with a triple of complex structures satisfying the quaternionic relations. A holomorphic Lagrangian variety on a hypercomplex manifold with trivial canonical bundle is a holomorphic subvariety which is calibrated by a form associated with the holomorphic volume form; this notion is a generalization of the usual holomorphic Lagrangian subvarieties known in hyperkaehler geometry. An HKT (hyperkaehler with torsion) metric on a hypercomplex manifold is a metric determined by a local potential, in a similar way to the Kaehler metric. We prove that a ba…
We study singularities of Lagrangian mean curvature flow in $\C^n$ when the initial condition is a zero-Maslov class Lagrangian. We start by showing that, in this setting, singularities are unavoidable. More precisely, we construct Lagrangians with arbitrarily small Lagrangian angle and Lagrangians which are Hamiltonian isotopic to a plane that, nevertheless, develop finite time singularities under mean curvature flow. We then prove two theorems regarding the tangent flow at a singularity when the initial condition is a zero-Maslov class Lagrangian. The first one (Theorem A) states that that t…
The main theme of this paper is the Thomas-Yau conjecture, primarily in the setting of exact, (quantitatively) almost calibrated, unobstructed Lagrangian branes inside Calabi-Yau Stein manifolds. In our interpretation, the conjecture is that Thomas-Yau semistability is equivalent to the existence of special Lagrangian representatives. We clarify how holomorphic curves enter this conjectural picture, through the construction of bordism currents between Lagrangians, and in the definition of the Solomon functional. Under some extra hypothesis, we shall prove Floer theoretic obstructions to the ex…
The space $\mathcal{H}$ of "almost calibrated" $(1,1)$ forms on a compact Kähler manifold plays an important role in the study of the deformed Hermitian-Yang-Mills equation of mirror symmetry as emphasized by recent work of the second author and Yau, and is related by mirror symmetry to the space of positive Lagrangians studied by Solomon. This paper initiates the study of the geometry of $\mathcal{H}$. We show that $\mathcal{H}$ is an infinite dimensional Riemannian manifold with non-positive sectional curvature. In the hypercritical phase case we show that $\mathcal{H}$ has a well-defined me…
The geometry of submanifolds is intimately related to the theory of functions and vector bundles. It has been of fundamental importance to find out how those two objects interact in many geometric and physical problems. A typical example of this relation is that the Picard group of line bundles on an algebraic manifold is isomorphic to the group of divisors, which is generated by holomorphic hypersurfaces modulo linear equivalence. A similar correspondence can be made between the K-group of sheaves and the Chow ring of holomorphic cycles. There are two more very recent examples of such a relat…
We consider D-branes in string theory and address the issue of how to describe them mathematically as a fundamental object (as opposed to a solitonic object) of string theory in the realm in differential and symplectic geometry. The notion of continuous maps, $k$-times differentiable maps, and smooth maps from an Azumaya/matrix manifold with a fundamental module to a (commutative) real manifold $Y$ is developed. Such maps are meant to describe D-branes or matrix branes in string theory when these branes are light and soft with only small enough or even zero brane-tension. When $Y$ is a symplec…
This paper gives a leisurely introduction to Calabi-Yau manifolds and special Lagrangian submanifolds from the differential geometric point of view, followed by a survey of recent results on singularities of special Lagrangian submanifolds, and their application to the SYZ Conjecture. It is aimed at graduate students in Geometry, String Theorists, and others wishing to learn the subject, and is designed to be fairly self-contained. It is based on lecture courses given at Nordfjordeid, Norway and MSRI, Berkeley in June and July 2001. We introduce Calabi-Yau m-folds via holonomy groups, Kahler g…
Given a parallel calibration $ϕ\in Ω^p(M)$ on a Riemannian manifold $M$, I prove that the $ϕ$--critical submanifolds with nonzero critical value are minimal submanifolds. I also show that the $ϕ$--critical submanifolds are precisely the integral manifolds of a $\mathscr{C}^\infty(M)$--linear subspace $\sP \subset Ω^p(M)$. In particular, the calibrated submanifolds are necessarily integral submanifolds of the system. (Examples of parallel calibrations include the special Lagrangian calibration on Calabi-Yau manifolds, (co)associative calibrations on $G_2$--manifolds, and the Cayley calibration …
