Involutions, Humbert surfaces, and divisors on a moduli space (Q619702)

Let \(\mathcal S_2\) be the Siegel upper half space of degree two, and let \(\Gamma (2)\) be the congruence subgroup of \(Sp (4, \mathbb Z)\) of level two. Then \(\mathcal M_2 = \Gamma (2) \backslash \mathcal S_2\) is a moduli space of principally polarized abelian surfaces with level two structure, and it has a compactification \(\mathcal M_2^*\), first constructed by Igusa. Compactification divisors \(\mathcal D_\ell\) and the Humbert surface divisor \(H_\Delta\) of discriminsant 1 are subvarieties of \(\mathcal M_2^*\), whose fundamental classes span \(H_4 (\mathcal M_2^*; \mathbb Z)\). In this paper the author studies another class of subvarieties, namely Humbert varieties \(K_h\) of degree 4, by using involutions in \(\mathcal M_2^*\). He describes the representation of their fundamental classes in terms of those of \(\mathcal D_\ell\) and \(H_\Delta\). If \(\mathcal M_2^*\) is considered as the space \(\overline{M}_{0,6}\) of stable curves of genus two with ordered Weierstrass points, he also shows that the divisors \(K_h\) are Keel-Vermeire divisors.