Curvature properties of the Calabi-Yau moduli (Q1419691)

In this note, the author discusses some curvature properties of the Weil-Petersson metric on Calabi-Yau moduli spaces. A Calabi-Yau manifold is a compact Kähler manifold with trivial canonical bundle. The local Kuranish family of polarized Calabi-Yau manifolds \(X \rightarrow S\) is smooth (unobstructed) by the Bogomolov-Tian-Todorov theorem. One can assign the unique (Ricci-flat) Yau metric \(g(s)\) on \(X_{s}\) in the polarized Kaehler class. Then, on a fiber \(X_{s} = X,\) the Kodaira-Spencer theory gives rise to an injective map \(\rho ; T_{s}(S) \rightarrow H^{1}(X, T_{X})\cong H^{0,1}_{\overline {\partial}}(T_{X})\) (harmonic representatives). The metric \(g(s)\) induces a metric on \(\Lambda^{0,1}(T_{X}).\) For \(v,w \in T_{s} (S),\) one then defines the Weil-Petersson metric on \(S\) by \[ g_{WP}(v,w) = \int_{X}\langle\rho(v),\rho(w)\rangle_{g(s)}. \] Theorem 2.1. For a given effectively parametrized polarized variation of Hodge structures \(H \rightarrow S\) of weight \(n\) with \(h^{n, 0} = 1, h^{n-1, 1} = d\) and smooth \(S,\) in terms of any holomorphic section \(\Omega\) of \(H^{n,0}\) and the infinitesimal period map \(\sigma,\) the Riemann curvature tensor of the Weil-Petersson metric \(g_{WP} = g_{i,\overline{j}} dt_{i}\otimes d \overline{t_{j}}\) on \(S\) is given by \[ R_{i \overline{j}k\overline{l}} = -(g_{i,\overline{j}}g_{k,\overline{l}} + g_{i,\overline{l}}g_{k,\overline{j}}) + \frac{\overline{Q} (\sigma_{i} \sigma_{k} \Omega,\overline{\sigma_{j}\sigma_{l}\Omega})} {\overline{Q}(\Omega,\overline{\Omega})} \] Two simple proofs of Theorem 2.1 are offered in paragraph 2. Theorem 3.1. For the Weil-Petersson metric \(g_{WP},\) we have (1) The holomorphic sectional curvature \(\sum_{i,j,k,l, R_{i\overline {j}k \overline{l}}} \xi^{i}\overline{\xi^{j}} \xi^{k}\overline{\xi^{l}} \geq -2 \mid \xi \mid^{4};\) (2) The Ricci curvature \(R_{i\overline{j}} \geq -(d + 1)g_{i\overline{j}};\) (3) The second term in (2.1) is ``Nakano semi-positive''.