No label defined (Q4379891)

This is an informal and rather detailed survey of the results by the authors in the algebraic and analytic construction of Gromov-Witten invariants. The main point is to construct the virtual moduli cycles which replace the fundamental classes in the case when the moduli spaces are not of the expected dimension. When the cycles are given the standard integration as in the definition of the Donaldson invariants will deliver a construction for the GW invariants. The construction for the cycles introduced by the authors has many nice properties, particularly, it has a functorial behavior with respect to the refined Gysin maps. The idea of the virtual cycles goes back to the Kontsevich construction of an virtual deformation obstruction complex appeared in his paper on the enumeration of rational curves. After the general theory there is an application to the moduli space of rational curves in a Calabi-Yau variety. -- The last part contains a comparison theorem for analytic approach to the GW invariants. For the entire collection see [Zbl 0882.00033].