Infinite energy harmonic maps and degeneration of hyperbolic surfaces in moduli space (Q1175268)

The author [ibid. 29, No. 2, 449-479 (1989; Zbl 0655.58009)] showed how to parametrize the Teichmüller space \({\mathcal T}_ g\) of closed Riemann surfaces of genus \(g\geq 2\) by holomorphic quadratic differentials associated to harmonic maps. In the present paper, he extends this idea to parametrize a neighborhood \(\mathcal N\) of the compactification \(\overline{\mathcal M}_ g\) of the moduli space \({\mathcal M}_ g\) of closed Riemann surfaces of genus \(g\geq 2\) as follows: An element of \(\overline{\mathcal M}_ g\backslash\mathcal M_ g\) can be thought of as a Riemann surface \(M\) with nodes. The author constructs a harmonic map from \(M\) to a nearby hyperbolic surface \((N,h)\). This map might, for example, open out a node to a closed geodesic. The resulting holomorphic quadratic differential is then used to give a parametrization of \(N\). Finally, he proves a result on real-analyticity of the hyperbolic metric \(h\) with respect to Fenchel-Nielsen coordinates.