SU(3)-structures and Special Lagrangian Geometries

Abstract

We generalize Calabi-Yau 3-folds from the special Lagrangian perspective. More precisely, we study SU(3)-structures which admit as "nice" a local special Lagrangian geometry as the flat $\mathbf{C}^3$ or a Calabi-Yau structure does. The underlying almost complex structure may not be integrable. Such SU(3)-structures are called {\it admissible}. Among these, we are particularly interested in a subclass of SU(3)-structures called {\it nearly Calabi-Yau}. We discuss the local generalities of admissible SU(3)-structures and nearly Calabi-Yau structures in Cartan's sense. Examples of nearly Calabi-Yau but non-Calabi-Yau structures as well as other admissible SU(3)-structures are constructed from the twistor spaces of self-dual Einstein 4-manifolds. Two classes of examples of complete special Lagrangian submanifolds are found by considering the anti-complex involution of the underlying SU(3)-structures. We finally show that the moduli space of compact special Lagrangian submanifolds in a nearly Calabi-Yau manifold behaves in the same way as the moduli in the Calabi-Yau case.