Families of quintic Calabi-Yau \(3-\) folds with discrete symmetries (Q930516)

Calabi-Yau threefolds with discrete symmetries are an interesting topic of study. They are phenomenologically interesting to string theorists and they have also proven to be a fertile background to implement new theories such as mirror symmetry. In this paper, the authors study certain families of quintic threefolds with discrete symmetries. For example, they exhibit one family with \(\mathbb{Z}_{41}\) and one with \(\mathbb{Z}_{51}\) symmetry. Based on Griffiths' work, the authors derive a generic method to compute the Picard-Fuchs equations satisifed by periods of all 3 forms in these families. This procedure generalizes and simplifies the techniques used by \textit{P. Candelas, X. de la Ossa} and \textit{F. Rodriguez-Villegas} [Calabi-Yau manifolds over finite fields. I. \url{arXiv:hep-th/0012233}]. The authors also analyze the effects of symmetry on the geometric monodromy representations. Finally, they count the number of vanishing Yukawa couplings induced by the symmetry of the elements in each family.