A Central Limit Theorem for the Kontsevich-Zorich Cocycle

Abstract

We show that a central limit theorem holds for exterior powers of the Kontsevich-Zorich (KZ) cocycle. In particular, we show that, under the hypothesis that the top Lyapunov exponent on the exterior power is simple, a central limit theorem holds for the lift of the (leafwise) hyperbolic Brownian motion to any strongly irreducible, symplectic, $\text{SL}(2,\mathbb{R})$-invariant subbundle, that is moreover symplectic-orthogonal to the so-called tautological subbundle. We then show that this implies that a central limit theorem holds for the lift of the Teichm\"uller geodesic flow to the same bundle. For the random cocycle over the hyperbolic Brownian motion, we prove under the same hypotheses that the variance of the top exponent is strictly positive. For the deterministic cocycle over the Teichm\"uller geodesic flow we prove that the variance is strictly positive only for the top exponent of the first exterior power (the KZ cocycle itself) under the hypothesis that its Lyapunov spectrum is simple.