Rationally connected varieties and loop spaces (Q2477153)

A complex projective manifold is a complex manifold, biholomorphic to a connected submanifold of some projective space \(\mathbb{P}^n(\mathbb{C})\). Such a manifold \(M\) is called rationally connected if it contains rational curves (= holomorphic images of \(\mathbb{P}^1(\mathbb{C})\)) through any finite collection of its points. This is equivalent to requiring that for a nonempty open \(U\subset M \times M\) and any \((p,q)\in U\) there should be a rational curve through \(p\) and \(q \). Projective spaces, Grassmannians, and in general complex projective manifolds birational to projective spaces are rationally connected. Let \(M\) be a complex manifold and \(r=0,1,\ldots,\infty\). The space \(C^r(S^1,M)\) of \(r\) times continuously differentiable maps \(x \colon S^1\to M\), the (free) \(C^r\) loop space of \(M\), carries a natural complex manifold structure, locally biholomorphic to open subsets of Banach \((r<\infty)\) resp. Fréchet \((r=\infty)\) spaces. The same is true for generalized loop spaces \(C^r(V,M)\), where \(V\) is a compact \(C^r\) manifold. A very general question is how complex analytical and geometrical properties of \(M\) and its loop spaces are related. In the paper under review, the authors prove that the loop space \(C^r(S^1,M)\) contains plenty of rational curves if \(M\) is rationally connected complex projective manifolds.