Moduli spaces of rank 2 instanton sheaves on the projective space (Q2406426)

An instanton bundle of charge \(n\) is a \(\mu\)-stable rank two bundle \(E\) on \(\mathbb P^3\) arising as the cohomology of a linear monad of the form \[ 0 \to {\mathcal O}_{\mathbb P^3} (-1)^n \to {\mathcal O}_{\mathbb P^3}^{(2+2n)} \to {\mathcal O}_{\mathbb P^3} (1)^n \to 0. \] Since the 1970s a lot of work has been done on the moduli spaces \({\mathcal I} (n)\) of these bundles. \textit{L. Costa} and \textit{G. Ottaviani} established that \({\mathcal I} (n)\) is affine [Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. 355, 49--55 (2003; Zbl 1031.14004)], \textit{A. S. Tikhomirov} showed \({\mathcal I} (n)\) is irreducible of dimension \(8n-3\) [Izv. Math. 76, 991--1073 (2012; Zbl 1262.14053) and Izv. Math. 77, 1195--1223 (2013; Zbl 1308.14045)] and \textit{Jardim and Verbitsky} showed \({\mathcal I} (n)\) is nonsingular [Compos. Math. 150, 1836--1868 (2014; Zbl 1396.14012)]. The space \({\mathcal I} (n)\) is open in the space \({\mathcal M} (n)\) of semistable rank 2 sheaves with Chern classes \(c_0=0, c_2=n, c_3=0\). In this paper the authors study a space which sits between these two, the space \({\mathcal L} (n) \subset {\mathcal M} (n)\) of semistable sheaves arising as the cohomology of a linear monad as above, the \textit{instanton sheaves}. When \(n=1\) or \(n=2\) the spaces \({\mathcal L} (n)\) are irreducible and there are some non-locally free sheaves in the closure of \({\mathcal I} (n)\), but \textit{M. Jardim} et al. constructed new components of \({\mathcal L} (n)\) for \(n>2\) [Ann. Mat. Pura Appl. 196, 1573--1608 (2017; Zbl 1481.14020)]. In the paper under review, the authors determine the irreducible components of \({\mathcal L} (3)\) (there are two, both of dimension \(21\)) and \({\mathcal L} (4)\) (there are four, three having dimension \(29\) and the other \(32\)). For a non-locally free instanton sheaf \(E\), the quotient \(Q=E^{\vee \vee}/E\) is semistable with Hilbert polynomial \(d(t+2)\), so the authors make a study of the moduli space \({\mathcal T} (d)\) of semistable sheaves with Hilbert polynomial \(P(t) = d t\). The give a description of the irreducible components of \(\mathcal T (d)\) for \(1 \leq d \leq 4\), which paves the way for their main theorem.