Moduli dimensions of lattice polygons (Q2114809)

The \emph{genus} of a lattice polygon \(P\) is the number of interior vertices. A lattice polygon \(P\) is called \emph{hyperelliptic} if its interior lattice points are collinear. Let \(\mathbb{M}_P\) denote the moduli space of skeletons of smooth tropical plane curves with Newton polygon \(P\). The authors classify the possible values for \(\dim \mathbb{M}_P\). More precisely, the possible values of \(\dim \mathbb{M}_P\) for non-hyperelliptic \(P\) and \(g \geq 3\) are \(\{g, \ldots, 2g+1\}\) minus the impossible combinations \((g, \dim \mathbb{M}_P) \in \{ (3,7), (4, 4), (7, 7) \}\) plus the exceptional case \((7, 16)\). With hyperelliptic \(P\) the possible values for \(\dim \mathbb{M}_P\) and \(g \geq 2\) are \(\{g, \ldots, 2g-1\}\). For the non-hyperelliptic case note that the upper bounds on \(\dim \mathbb{M}_P\) have been established in [\textit{S. Brodsky} et al., Res. Math. Sci. 2, Paper No. 4, 31 p. (2015; Zbl 1349.14043)]. The bulk of the work in the present article is to establish the lower bound, especially for the exceptional cases. In order to show that every intermediate value for \(\dim \mathbb{M}_P\) is attained, the authors give explicit polygons. Furthermore, the authors show their theorem to be false when only \emph{maximal} lattice polygons are allowed. For the hyperelliptic case, the authors use the complete classification of hyperelliptic lattice polygons. They derive a formula for the dimension of the moduli space of smooth tropical plane curves dual to a given unimodular triangulation. Based on this formula, \(\dim \mathbb{M}_P\) is computed for any hyperelliptic polygon of genus \(g \geq 2\).