Hyperk\"ahler Degenerations from Parabolic $\mathrm{SL}(2,\mathbb{C})$-Higgs Bundles Moduli Spaces on the Punctured Sphere to Hyperpolygon Spaces

TL;DR

This paper explores the relationship between moduli spaces of parabolic Higgs bundles and hyperpolygon spaces, demonstrating a limit process that connects ALG-$D_4$ and ALE-$D_4$ hyperk"ahler manifolds, with implications for gravitational instantons.

Contribution

It establishes a diffeomorphism between hyperpolygon spaces and moduli spaces of parabolic Higgs bundles, and shows a limit process connecting ALG-$D_4$ and ALE-$D_4$ hyperk"ahler metrics for any finite number of punctures.

Findings

Hyperpolygon spaces are diffeomorphic to certain moduli spaces of Higgs bundles.

A degenerate limit of ALG-$D_4$ metrics converges to ALE-$D_4$ metrics as a parameter tends to zero.

The results extend beyond the four-puncture case to any finite number of punctures.

Abstract

Complete hyperk\"ahler 4-manifolds of finite energy are grouped into ALE, ALF, ALG$^{(*)}$, ALH$^{(*)}$, each of these being further classified according to the Dynkin type of their noncompact end. A family of ALG-$D_4$ spaces are modeled by certain moduli spaces of strongly parabolic $\mathrm{SL}(2,\mathbb{C})$-Higgs bundles on the Riemann sphere with $n=4$ punctures. Meanwhile, a family of ALE-$D_4$ spaces are modeled by certain Nakajima quiver varieties known as $n=4$ hyperpolygon spaces. There is a map from hyperpolygon space to the moduli space of strong parabolic $\mathrm{SL}(2,\mathbb{C})$-Higgs bundles that is a diffeomorphism onto its open and dense image. We show that under a fine-tuned degenerate limit, the pullback of a family of ALG-$D_4$ metrics parameterized by $R$ converges pointwise to the ALE-$D_4$ metric as $R \to 0$. While the connection to gravitational instantons occurs in the $n=4$ case, we prove our result for any finite $n$.