Quotient categories, stability conditions, and birational geometry (Q476418)

The authors study a sequence of quotients \(\text{Coh}_{(c)}(X)\) of the category \(\text{Coh}(X)\) of coherent sheaves on a variety \(X\), obtained by modding out by sheaves supported in codimension~\(>c\). Assuming \(X\) irreducible smooth projective, it is shown that these categories have homological dimension \(c\), making them potentially more tractable than \(\text{Coh}(X)\) for many purposes. The authors give an application to Bridgeland stability conditions, after introducing similar quotients of the derived category \(\text{D}^b(X)\). They also give an interpretation of these categories in terms of birational geometry. Some main results are as follows, where we write \(\text{D}^b_{(c)}(X)\) for the quotient of \(\text{D}^b(X)\) by objects supported in codimension~\(>c\). Mumford's \(\mu\)-stability naturally induces a Bridgeland stability condition on the category \(\text{D}^b_{(1)}(X)\), and the authors give a full description of the space of such stability conditions: the usual action of the universal cover of the orientation-preserving subgroup of \(\text{GL}(2,\mathbb{R})\) is found to be free, and its orbits are irreducible components, parametrized by certain classes in the cone of curves~\(N_1(X)_{\mathbb{R}}\). The authors describe, for each \(c\), a natural class of rational maps which induce exact (pullback) functors between categories \(\text{Coh}_{(c)}\). They show that the category \(\text{D}^b_{(0)}(X)\), obtained by modding out by torsion objects, determines the birational equivalence class of \(X\). They further show that \(\text{D}^b_{(1)}(X)\) determines \(X\) up to birational equivalences which are isomorphisms in codimension~ \(1\), and that the exact autoequivalences of this category are generated by pullbacks along such birational maps, twists by line bundles, and homological shifts.