Virtual classes and virtual motives of Quot schemes on threefolds (Q2182275)

In this paper, the author constructs virtual classes and virtual motives on the Quot schemes of a locally free sheaf on certain smooth quasi-projective 3-folds and solves their enumerative theories, obtaining new examples of higher rank Donaldson-Thomas invariants. Let \(F\) be a locally free sheaf on a smooth projective 3-fold \(Y\) and denote by \(\mathrm{Quot}_Y(F,n)\) the Quot scheme of \(0\)-dimensional quotients of \(F\). Exploiting the deformation theory of the kernels of the surjections (rather than looking at deformations of the quotients), the authors constructs a perfect obstruction theory in the following two cases: 1. \(H^i(Y, \mathcal{O}_Y)=0\) for \(i> 0\) and \(F\) is an exceptional vector bundle; 2. \(Y\) is Calabi-Yau and \(F\) is a simple rigid vector bundle. A vector bundle \(F\) is said to be simple if \(\mathrm{Hom}(F,F)=\mathbb{C} \), rigid if \(\mathrm{Ext}^1(F,F)=0\) and exceptional if it is simple and \(\mathrm{Ext}^i(F,F)=0\) for any \(i> 0\). Remarkably, this perfect obstruction theory is point-wise symmetric in both cases, but is globally symmetric only if \(Y\) is Calabi-Yau. By the machinery of Behrend-Fantechi, the perfect obstruction theory defines a virtual fundamental class \([\mathrm{Quot}_Y(F,n)]^{vir}\in A_0(\mathrm{Quot}_Y(F,n))\). For a fixed pair \((Y,F)\) satisfying the hypotheses needed to construct the virtual cycle, one can consider the generating series \(\mathrm{DT}_F(q)\) counting the degree of the virtual cycle for any \(n\geq 0\). The author proposes the conjectural closed formula \[ \mathrm{DT}_F(q)=\mathrm{M}((-1)^r q)^{r\int_Y c_3(T_Y\otimes \omega_Y )} \] where \(\mathrm{M}\) is the Macmahon function and \(r\) is the rank of \(F\). Surprisingly, these invariants seem to depend only on \(Y\) and the rank of the vector bundle. This formula has been proven in the rank 1 case for any 3-fold by Levine-Pandharipande and Jun Li. In the higher rank case, the author proves the formula in the Calabi-Yau case, by using Behrend's constructible function. In this case, the formula reduces to \[ \mathrm{DT}_F(q)=\mathrm{M}((-1)^r q)^{r\chi(Y)} \] where \(\chi(Y)\) is the topological Euler characteristic of \(Y\). In the second part of the paper, all the conditions on \((Y,F)\) are dropped and it is constructed a virtual motive \([\mathrm{Quot}_Y(F,n)]_{vir}\in \mathcal{M}_{\mathbb{C}}\) for any locally free sheaf \(F\) on a smooth quasi-projective 3-fold \(Y\), where \(\mathcal{M}_{\mathbb{C}}\) is obtained by formally inverting a square root of the Lefschetz motive \(\mathbb{L}=[\mathbb{A}^1_{\mathbb{C}}]\) in the Grothendieck group of complex varieties. For a fixed pair \((Y,F)\), denote by \(Z_r(Y, t)\) the generating series of the virtual motives. The author proves the formula \[ Z_r(Y, (-1)^r t)=\mathrm{Exp}\left(\frac{(-1)t^r [Y\times \mathbb{P}^{r-1}]}{(1-(-\mathbb{L}^{-1/2})^rt)(1-(-\mathbb{L}^{1/2})^rt)} \right), \] where \(\mathrm{Exp}\) is the motivic exponential, generalizing the computation of Behrend-Bryan-Szendröi in the rank 1 case.