Bott-Chern forms and arithmetic intersections (Q1373332)

Arakelov theory is an intersection theory for varieties over rings of algebraic integers. It was fully developed in arbitrary dimension by Gillet and Soulé. There are arithmetic Chern classes for vector bundles equipped with hermitian metrics at the places at infinity. These Chern classes have the usual properties, except that the product formula is not true in general for short exact sequences of hermitian vector bundles. This failure is measured by the Bott-Chern form and the main aim of this paper is to describe it as explicitly as possible in several important cases (projectively flat middle term). The key application given here is the computation of the arithmetic Chow ring of the Grassmannian over the integers.