Manifold properties of planar polygon spaces (Q1616992)

Let \({ l} = \{{ l}_{1} , \ldots , { l}_{n}\} \) be an \(n\)-tuple of positive real numbers, and let \(M( l)\) (resp. \(\bar{M}( l)\)) denote the space of \(n\)-gons in the plane with successive side lengths given by \( l\), identified under oriented isometry (resp. isometry). If there is no subset \(S \subset \{1, \ldots , n\}\) such that the sum of the lengths corresponding to \(S\) is equal to the sum of those not in \(S\) the set \( l\) is called generic and \(M( l)\) and \(\bar{M}( l)\) are \((n-3)\)-manifolds. This paper obtains results on the tangent bundle of \(\bar{M}( l)\). In particular the sum of this bundle with a trivial line bundle is shown to be isomorphic to the \((n-2)\)-fold sum of the canonical line bundle over \(\bar{M}( l)\)