The monomial-divisor mirror map

Abstract

For each family of Calabi-Yau hypersurfaces in toric varieties, Batyrev has proposed a possible mirror partner (which is also a family of Calabi-Yau hypersurfaces). We explain a natural construction of the isomorphism between certain Hodge groups of these hypersurfaces, as predicted by mirror symmetry, which we call the monomial-divisor mirror map. We indicate how this map can be interpreted as the differential of the expected mirror isomorphism between the moduli spaces of the two Calabi-Yau manifolds. We formulate a very precise conjecture about the form of that mirror isomorphism, which when combined with some earlier conjectures of the third author would completely specify it. We then conclude that the moduli spaces of the nonlinear sigma models whose targets are the different birational models of a Calabi-Yau space should be connected by analytic continuation, and that further analytic continuation should lead to moduli spaces of other kinds of conformal field theories. (This last conclusion was first drawn by Witten.)