On the degeneration of asymptotically conical Calabi-Yau metrics (Q2160201)

This paper studies the degeneration of non-compact Calabi-Yau manifolds with asymptotically conical ends at infinity, and uses this as a tool to construct asymptotically conical Calabi-Yau metrics with local singularities, which admit crepant resolutions. The singular metrics arise when the exceptional locus shrinks to zero size, and the authors identify the homeomorphism type of the limiting metric with the singular variety itself. Some geometric applications include conifold transition type pictures for the distinct small resolutions of compound du Val singularities. Towards the end, the authors mention an interpretation of the new singular Calabi-Yau metrics as a Morse flow line interpolating between the Sasaki-Einstein cones at infinity and at the origin. Results of the same kind were previously known in the compact case, and the main novelty is to incorporate the asymptotic at infinity. While in the compact case the singular metric is known a priori from pluripotential theory, here its existence is derived from uniform estimates on the smooth metric sequence, which allows passage to the limit away from singularity. The main new ingredient which does not appear already in the compact case is the construction of background metrics. The authors then prove some extension of the Kähler potential across singularity, and some uniqueness statements concerning the singular metric. To identify the homeomorphism type, the authors appeal to some Hölmander technique and Donaldson-Sun theory ideas.