On the fundamental group of the space of harmonic 2-spheres in the \(n\)- sphere (Q1323463)

The authors consider the space \(\text{Harm}(S^ 2, S^ n)\) of harmonic maps \(\phi: S^ 2 \to S^ n\). Using the description of such maps in terms of holomorphic data, namely Calabi's description of harmonic maps in terms of horizontal holomorphic maps into the appropriate twistor space, and applying the method of group actions and Morse-theoretic deformations of harmonic maps, they compute the fundamental group of the space of harmonic maps, obtaining the following result for the subspace \(\text{Harm}_ d (S^ 2,S^ n)\) of maps of degree \(d\): \[ \pi_ 1(\text{Harm}_ d(S^ 2, S^ n)) = \begin{cases} 0 & \text{if \(n \geq 4\), \(d \neq 2\)}\\ \mathbb{Z}/2\mathbb{Z} & \text{if \(n \geq 4\), \(d = 2\)}\\ \mathbb{Z}/2d\mathbb{Z} & \text{if \(n = 3\)} \end{cases}. \]