We analyze infinitesimal deformations of morphisms of locally free sheaves on a smooth projective variety X over an algebraically closed field of characteristic zero. In particular, we describe a differential graded Lie algebra controlling the deformation problem. As an application, we study infinitesimal deformations of the pairs given by a locally free sheaf and a subspace of its sections with a view toward Brill-Noether theory.

We generalize Illusie’s definition of the Atiyah class to complexes with quasi-coherent cohomology on arbitrary algebraic stacks. We show that this gives a global obstruction theory for moduli stacks of complexes in algebraic geometry without derived methods. We give a similar generalization of the reduced Atiyah class, and we show various useful properties for working with Atiyah classes, such as compatibilities between the reduced and ordinary Atiyah class, and compatibility with tensor products and determinants.

Valuation rings and perfectoid rings are examples of (usually non-Noetherian) rings that behave in some sense like regular rings. We give and study an extension of the concept of regular local rings to non-Noetherian rings so that it includes valuation and perfectoid rings and it is related to Grothendieck’s definition of formal smoothness as in the Noetherian case. For that, we have to take into account the topologies. We prove a descent theorem for regularity along flat homomorphisms (in fact for homomorphisms of finite flat dimension), extending some known results from the Noetherian to the non-Noetherian case, as well as generalizing some recent results in the non-Noetherian case, such as the descent of regularity from perfectoid rings by B. Bhatt, S. Iyengar and L. Ma.

We prove that actions of complex reductive Lie groups on a holomorphic vector bundle over a complex compact manifold are locally extendable to its local moduli space.

Let $C$ be a Petri general curve of genus $g$ and $E$ a general stable vector bundle of rank $r$ and slope $g-1$ over $C$ with $h^{0}(C,E)=r+1$. For $g\geqslant (2r+2)(2r+1)$, we show how the bundle $E$ can be recovered from the tangent cone to the generalised theta divisor $\unicode[STIX]{x1D6E9}_{E}$ at ${\mathcal{O}}_{C}$. We use this to give a constructive proof and a sharpening of Brivio and Verra’s theorem that the theta map $\mathit{SU}_{C}(r){\dashrightarrow}|r\unicode[STIX]{x1D6E9}|$ is generically injective for large values of $g$.

We give a descent result for formal smoothness having interesting applications: we deduce that quasiexcellence descends along flat local homomorphisms of finite type, we greatly improve Kunz’s characterization of regular local rings by means of the Frobenius homomorphisms as well as André and Radu relativization of this result, etc. In the second part of the paper, we study a similar question for the complete intersection property instead of formal smoothness, giving also some applications.

We study infinitesimal deformations of holomorphic maps of compact, complex, Kähler manifolds. In particular, we describe a generalization of Bloch's semiregularity map that annihilates obstructions to deform holomorphic maps with fixed codomain.

Let $\mathcal{F}$ be a coherent rank 2 sheaf on a scheme $Y\,\subset \,{{\mathbb{P}}^{n}}$ of dimension at least two and let $X\,\subset \,Y$ be the zero set of a section $\sigma \,\in \,{{H}^{0}}\left( \mathcal{F} \right)$. In this paper, we study the relationship between the functor that deforms the pair $\left( \mathcal{F},\,\sigma \right)$ and the two functors that deform $\mathcal{F}$ on $Y$, and $X$ in $Y$, respectively. By imposing some conditions on two forgetful maps between the functors, we prove that the scheme structure of e.g., the moduli scheme ${{\text{M}}_{\text{Y}}}\left( P \right)$ of stable sheaves on a threefold $Y$ at $\left( \mathcal{F} \right)$, and the scheme structure at ($X$) of the Hilbert scheme of curves on $Y$ become closely related. Using this relationship, we get criteria for the dimension and smoothness of ${{\text{M}}_{\text{Y}}}\left( P \right)$ at $\left( \mathcal{F} \right)$, without assuming $\text{Ex}{{\text{t}}^{2}}\left( \mathcal{F},\,\mathcal{F} \right)\,=\,0$. For reflexive sheaves on $Y\,=\,{{\mathbb{P}}^{3}}$ whose deficiency module $M\,=\,H_{*}^{1}\left( \mathcal{F} \right)$ satisfies $_{0}\text{Ex}{{\text{t}}^{2}}\left( M,\,M \right)\,=\,0$ (e.g., of diameter at most 2), we get necessary and sufficient conditions of unobstructedness that coincide in the diameter one case. The conditions are further equivalent to the vanishing of certain graded Betti numbers of the free graded minimal resolution of $H_{*}^{0}\left( \mathcal{F} \right)$. Moreover, we show that every irreducible component of ${{\text{M}}_{\mathbb{P}}}^{3}\left( P \right)$ containing a reflexive sheaf of diameter one is reduced (generically smooth) and we compute its dimension. We also determine a good lower bound for the dimension of any component of ${{\text{M}}_{\mathbb{P}}}^{3}\left( P \right)$ that contains a reflexive stable sheaf with “small” deficiency module $M$.

In this paper we prove that most ropes of arbitrary multiplicity supported on smooth curves can be smoothed. By a rope being smoothable we mean that the rope is the flat limit of a family of smooth, irreducible curves. To construct a smoothing, we connect, on the one hand, deformations of a finite morphism to projective space and, on the other hand, morphisms from a rope to projective space. We also prove a general result of independent interest, namely that finite covers onto smooth irreducible curves embedded in projective space can be deformed to a family of 1:1 maps. We apply our general theory to prove the smoothing of ropes of multiplicity 3 on P1. Even though this paper focuses on ropes of dimension 1, our method yields a general approach to deal with the smoothing of ropes of higher dimension.

We introduce the notion of twisted jets. For a Deligne–Mumford stack $\mathscr{X}$ of finite type over $\mathbb{C}$, a twisted $\infty$-jet on $\mathscr{X}$ is a representable morphism $\mathscr{D} \to \mathscr{X}$ such that $\mathscr{D}$ is a smooth Deligne–Mumford stack with the coarse moduli space Spec$\mathbb{C}[[t]]$. We study a motivic measure on the space of the twisted $\infty$-jets on a smooth Deligne–Mumford stack. As an application, we prove that two birational minimal models with Gorenstein quotient singularities have the same orbifold cohomology as a Hodge structure.