Towards a classification of modular compactifications of $\mathcal {M}_{g,n}$

Abstract

The moduli space of smooth curves admits a beautiful compactification $\mathcal{M}_{g,n} \subset \overline{\mathcal{M}}_{g,n}$ by the moduli space of stable curves. In this paper, we undertake a systematic classification of alternate modular compactifications of $\mathcal{M}_{g,n}$ . Let $\mathcal{U}_{g,n}$ be the (non-separated) moduli stack of all n-pointed reduced, connected, complete, one-dimensional schemes of arithmetic genus g. When g=0, $\mathcal{U}_{0,n}$ is irreducible and we classify all open proper substacks of $\mathcal{U}_{0,n}$ . When g≥1, $\mathcal{U}_{g,n}$ may not be irreducible, but there is a unique irreducible component $\mathcal{V}_{g,n} \subset\mathcal{U}_{g,n}$ containing $\mathcal{M}_{g,n}$ . We classify open proper substacks of $\mathcal {V}_{g,n}$ satisfying a certain stability condition.