Gromov-Witten theory of product stacks (Q303515)

Let \(\mathcal{X}\) be a smooth, proper Deligne-Mumford stack with projective coarse moduli space. The Gromov-Witten invariants of \(\mathcal{X}\) can be defined as certain intersection numbers in the moduli stack \(\overline{\mathcal{M}}(\mathcal{X}, \tilde{\tau})\) of twisted stable maps into \(\mathcal{X}\) with sections at the markings. More precisely, there are evaluation maps \(ev_{\tilde{\tau}} : \overline{\mathcal{M}}(\mathcal{X}, \tilde{\tau}) \to I(\mathcal{X})^{\times n}\), where \(I(\mathcal{X})\) is the nonrigidified inertia stack of \(\mathcal{X}\), then the Gromov-Witten invariants of \(\mathcal{X}\) are (up to multiplicative constants) integrals of cohomology classes \(ev^*_{\tilde{\tau}} ( \omega)\) over the virtual fundamental class \([\overline{\mathcal{M}}(\mathcal{X}, \tilde{\tau})]^{\text{vir}}\) of \(\overline{\mathcal{M}}(\mathcal{X}, \tilde{\tau})\). Here, \(\omega \in H^*(I(\mathcal{X})^{\times n}, \mathbb{Q})\), and the \(\tilde{\tau}\)'s are \textit{gerby \(\mathcal{X}\)-graphs} (defined in Definition 2.16), that are graphs with additional structures used to prescribe the topological types of twisted stable maps (they are analogous to modular graphs in the Gromov-Witten theory of varieties), \(n= |S_{\tilde{\tau}}|\) is the number of tails of \(\tilde{\tau}\) (\(S_{\tilde{\tau}}\) being the set of tails of \({\tilde{\tau}}\)). The main result of the article is a formula that expresses the Gromov-Witten invariants of the product \(\mathcal{X}_1 \times \mathcal{X}_2\) of two stacks \(\mathcal{X}_1\), \(\mathcal{X}_2\) as before in terms of the Gromov-Witten invariants of \(\mathcal{X}_1\) and \(\mathcal{X}_2\). The result is formulated in the setting of Gromov-Witten classes, which can be defined as follows. For any gerby \(\mathcal{X}\)-graph \(\tilde{\tau}\), there is a morphism \(st_{\tilde{\tau}} : \overline{\mathcal{M}}(\mathcal{X}, \tilde{\tau}) \to \overline{M}(\tau^s)\), where \(\tau^s\) is the stable graph associated to \(\tilde{\tau}\), and \(\overline{M}(\tau^s)\) is the moduli stack of \(\tau^s\)-marked stable curves. Then the \textit{Gromov-Witten class} associated to \(\mathcal{X}\) and \(\tilde{\tau}\) is, up to a multiplicative factor, the morphism \[ I^{\mathcal{X}}_{\tilde{\tau}} : H^*(I(\mathcal{X}^{\times |S_{\tilde{\tau}}|}), \mathbb{Q}) \to H_*(\overline{M}(\tau^s), \mathbb{Q}) \] that associates to any \(\omega\), the homology class \({st_{\tilde{\tau}}}_* (ev_{\tilde{\tau}}^*(\omega) \cap [\overline{\mathcal{M}}(\mathcal{X}, \tilde{\tau})]^w)\), where \([\overline{\mathcal{M}}(\mathcal{X}, \tilde{\tau})]^w\) is the weighted virtual fundamental class. The main theorem of the article (Theorem 4.6) can be stated as follows. Let \(\tilde{\tau}\) be a gerby \(\mathcal{X}_1 \times \mathcal{X}_2\)-graph, and let \(\tilde{\tau}_i\) be the associated gerby \(\mathcal{X}_i\)-graph, \(i=1,2\). Then, for any pair of cohomology classes \(\omega_i \in H^*(I(\mathcal{X}^{\times |S_{\tilde{\tau}_i}|}), \mathbb{Q})\), \(i=1,2\), the following relation holds true in \(H_*(\overline{M}(\tau^s), \mathbb{Q})\): \[ I^{\mathcal{X}_1 \times \mathcal{X}_2}_{\tilde{\tau}} (\omega_1 \otimes \omega_2) = I^{\mathcal{X}_1}_{\tilde{\tau}_1}(\omega_1) \cup I^{\mathcal{X}_2}_{\tilde{\tau}_2}(\omega_2) \, . \] Where \(\tau^s\) is the common absolute stabilization of \(\tilde{\tau}, \tilde{\tau}_1, \tilde{\tau}_2\), and \(\omega_1 \otimes \omega_2 \in H^*(I(\mathcal{X}_1 \times \mathcal{X}_2)^{\times |S_{\tilde{\tau}}|}, \mathbb{Q})\) is the cohomology class associated via the Künneth isomorphism to \(\omega_1\) and \(\omega_2\) (by Lemma 4.1 there is a natural isomorphism \(I(\mathcal{X}_1 \times \mathcal{X}_2) \cong I(\mathcal{X}_1) \times I(\mathcal{X}_2)\)). In the last section of the paper, the authors give an application of the main theorem to study the Gromov-Witten theory of trivial gerbes over Deligne-Mumford stacks and they verify the Gromov-Witten theoretic decomposition conjecture in this case.