Remembering Steve Zucker

I am a topologist whose main interests include the study of the topology of complex algebraic varieties (i.e. spaces that are the set of common zeros of a finite number of complex polynomials). What fascinates me is the interaction between the topology, geometry and arithmetic of varieties defined over subfields of the complex numbers, particularly those defined over number fields. My main tools include differential forms, Hodge theory and Galois theory, in addition to the more traditional tools used by topologists. Topics of current interest to me include:

• the topology and related geometry of various moduli spaces, such as the moduli spaces of smooth curves and moduli spaces of principally polarized abelian varieties;
• the study of fundamental groups of algebraic varieties, particularly of moduli spaces whose fundamental groups are mapping class groups;
• the study of various enriched structures (Hodge structures, Galois actions, and periods) of fundamental groups of algebraic varieties;
• polylogarithms, mixed zeta values, and their elliptic generalizations, which occur as periods of fundamental groups of moduli spaces of curves. 

A central theme in mathematics has been the interplay between topology and analysis. One subject here is the representation of topological invariants (such as cohomology) by analytic means (such as harmonic forms). For compact manifolds this is the well-known Hodge-deRham theory. Professor Saper studies generalizations of these ideas to singular spaces, in particular complex algebraic varieties. In these cases, an appropriate replacement for ordinary cohomology is Goresky and MacPherson's intersection cohomology, while on the analytic side it is natural to impose L²-growth conditions.

When one deals with varieties defined by polynomials with coefficients in the rationals, or more generally some finite extension, this theory takes on number theoretic significance. Important examples of such varieties are the locally symmetric varieties. One may reduce the defining equations modulo a prime and count the number of resulting solutions; all this data is wrapped up into a complex analytic function, the Hasse-Weil zeta function. This should be viewed as an object on the topological side of the above picture. On the analytic side, Langlands has associated L-functions to certain automorphic representations. The issue of whether one may express the Hasse-Weil zeta function in terms of automorphic L-functions, and the relation of special values of these functions to number theory, are important fundamental problems which are motivating Professor Saper's research.