Collapsing \(K3\) surfaces, tropical geometry and moduli compactifications of Satake, Morgan-Shalen type (Q2040922)

The authors conjecture and partially prove that the boundary of the so-called MSBJ compactification of the moduli space of \(K3\) surfaces parametrizes Gromov-Hausdorff limits. The MSBJ compactification was introduced in [\textit{Y. Odaka}, Int. Math. Res. Not. 2019, No. 21, 6614--6660 (2019; Zbl 1431.14050)] and generalizes an earlier construction from [\textit{J. W. Morgan} and \textit{P. B. Shalen}, Ann. Math. (2) 120, 401--476 (1984; Zbl 0583.57005)]. The construction can be applied more generally to arithmetic quotients of Hermitian symmetric domains. As a first result the authors show that the MSBJ compactification agrees with the Satake compactification associated to the adjoint representation. Applying this result to the moduli space of principally polarized abelian varieties \(\mathcal{A}_g\), the authors identify elements in the boundary of \(\overline{\mathcal{A}_g}^{MSBJ}\) with tropical principally polarized abelian varieties. Moving on to the moduli space \(\mathcal{F}_{2d}\) of polarized \(K3\) surfaces and its Satake compactification with respect to the adjoint representation \(\overline{\mathcal{F}}_{2d}^{Sat}\), the authors construct a \textit{geometric realization map} \(\Phi\) which associates to each element in \(\overline{\mathcal{F}}_{2d}^{Sat}\) a metric space of diameter 1. Over parts of the boundary, \(\Phi\) gives tropical \(K3\) surfaces. The main conjecture now claims that \(\Phi\) is continuous with respect to the Gromov-Hausdorff metric. This is verified for the restriction of \(\Phi\) to certain strata of \(\overline{\mathcal{F}}_{2d}^{Sat}\). A similar definition, conjecture, and partial proof is given for the moduli space of \(K3\) surfaces \(\mathcal{M}_{K3}\). Finally, an extension of the conjecture to higher dimensional hyperKähler varieties and even more general \(K\)-trivial varieties is suggested.