The weight-two Hodge structure of moduli spaces of sheaves on a K3 surface

Abstract

We prove that the weight-two Hodge structure of moduli spaces of torsion-free sheaves on a K3 surface is as described by Mukai (the rank is arbitrary but we assume the first Chern class is primitive). We prove the moduli space is an irreducible symplectic variety (by Mukai's work it was known to be symplectic). By work of Beauville, this implies that its $H^2$ has a canonical integral non-degenrate quadratic form; Mukai's recepee for $H^2$ includes a description of Beauville's quadratic form. As an application we compute higher-rank Donaldson polynomials of $K3$ surfaces.