Hermitian-holomorphic (2)-gerbes and tame symbols

Ettore Aldrovandi

The tame symbol of two invertible holomorphic functions can be obtained by computing their cup product in Deligne cohomology, and it is geometrically interpreted as a holomorphic line bundle with connection. In a similar vein, certain higher tame symbols later considered by Brylinski and McLaughlin are geometrically interpreted as holomorphic gerbes and $2$-gerbes with abelian band and a suitable connective structure.

In this paper we observe that the line bundle associated to the tame symbol of two invertible holomorphic functions also carries a fairly canonical hermitian metric, hence it represents a class in a Hermitian holomorphic Deligne cohomology group.

We put forward an alternative definition of hermitian holomorphic structure on a gerbe which is closer to the familiar one for line bundles and does not rely on an explicit ``reduction of the structure group.'' Analogously to the case of holomorphic line bundles, a uniqueness property for the connective structure compatible with the hermitian-holomorphic structure on a gerbe is also proven. Similar results are proved for $2$-gerbes as well.

We then show the hermitian structures so defined propagate to a class of higher tame symbols previously considered by Brylinski and McLaughlin, which are thus found to carry corresponding hermitian-holomorphic structures. Therefore we obtain an alternative characterization for certain higher Hermitian holomorphic Deligne cohomology groups.