Analytic Construction of Rational Curves on Fano Manifolds

Abstract

Inspired by methods for constructing entire curves in Oka geometry, we give an analytic construction of rational curves on a complex Fano manifold $X$. Yau's theorem provides a K\"ahler metric with positive Ricci curvature. Using this curvature to guide deformations of holomorphic discs, we construct maps from discs of radii tending to infinity with uniformly bounded area. A central point is to preserve the derivative normalization through the limiting process. This yields a nonconstant entire map $f:\mathbb C\rightarrow X$ of finite area. This map extends across infinity to a nonconstant holomorphic map $\mathbb P^1\to X$. Combined with algebraic arguments in characteristic zero, the construction yields proofs of the rational connectedness of Fano manifolds and of Hartshorne's conjecture on ample tangent bundles.