Weil-Petersson volumes and cone surfaces (Q833335)

This paper calculates recurrence relations for Weil-Petersson volumes \(V_{g,n} (L)\) of moduli spaces of hyperbolic surfaces with genus \(g\), and \(n\) boundary components of fixed length \(L = (l_1, \dots, l_n)\). These volumes are polynomials in the lengths. Recurrence relations were first calculated by \textit{M. Mirzakhani} [Invent. Math. 167, No.~1, 179--222 (2007; Zbl 1125.30039)]. The main innovation in this paper is to use intermediate moduli spaces of surfaces with cone points of specific angles. An important consequence is that the main formula consists of a recurrence relating \(V_{g,n+1}(l_1, \dots l_{n+1})\) to \(V_{g,n}(l_1, \dots, l_n)\) with no lower order terms. The technique used is to calculate recurrence relations involving the intermediate moduli space with \(n\) boundary components and \(1\) marked point with a cone angle \(\phi\), and let \(\phi \rightarrow \pi\). The authors also include a MAPLE script for calculating \(V_{0, n}(L)\).