Let X → B be a proper flat morphism between smooth quasiprojective varieties of relative dimension n, and L → X a line bundle which is ample on the fibers. We establish formulas for the first two terms in the Knudsen-Mumford expansion for det(πLk) in terms of Deligne pairings of L and the relative canonical bundle K. This generalizes the theorem of Deligne [1], which holds for families of relative dimension one. As a corollary, we show that when X is smooth, the line bundle η associated to X → B, which was introduced in Phong-Sturm [12], coincides with the CM bundle defined by Paul-Tian [10, 11]. In a second and third corollaries, we establish asymptotics for the K-energy along Bergman rays generalizing the formulas obtained in [11].

Motivated by the possible characterization of Sasakian manifolds in terms of twistor forms, we give the complete classification of compact Riemannian manifolds carrying a Killing vector field whose covariant derivative (viewed as a 2–form) is a twistor form.

The LaplaceBeltrami operator of a smooth Riemannian manifold is determined by the Riemannian metric. Conversely, the heat kernel constructed from the eigenvalues and eigenfunctions of the LaplaceBeltrami operator determines the Riemannian metric. This work proves the analogy on Euclidean polyhedral surfaces (triangle meshes), that the discrete heat kernel and the discrete Riemannian metric (unique up to a scaling) are mutually determined by each other. Given a Euclidean polyhedral surface, its Riemannian metric is represented as edge lengths, satisfying triangle inequalities on all faces. The LaplaceBeltrami operator is formulated using the cotangent formula, where the edge weight is defined as the sum of the cotangent of angles against the edge. We prove that the edge lengths can be determined by the edge weights unique up to a scaling using the variational approach.

In this paper we prove a new matrix Li-Yau-Hamilton (LYH) estimate for K¨ahler-Ricci flow on manifolds with nonnegative bi- sectional curvature. The form of this new LYH estimate is obtained by the interpolation consideration originated in [Ch] by Chow. This new inequality is shown to be connected with Perelman’s entropy formula through a family of differential equalities. In the rest of the paper, we show several applications of this new estimate and its corresponding estimate for linear heat equation. These include a sharp heat kernel comparison theorem, generalizing the earlier result of Li and Tian [LT], a manifold version of Stoll’s theorem [St] on the characterization of ‘algebraic divisors’, and a localized monotonicity formula for analytic subvari- eties, which sharpens the Bishop volume comparison theorem. Motivated by the connection between the heat kernel estimate and the reduced volume monotonicity of Perelman [P], we prove a sharp lower bound of the fundamental solution to the forward conjugate heat equation, which in a certain sense dual to Perelman’s monotonicity of the reduced volume. As an application of this new monotonicity formula, we show that the blow-down limit of a certain type of long-time solution is a gradient expanding soliton, generalizing an earlier result of Cao. We also illustrate the connection between the new LYH estimate and the Hessian comparison theorem of [FIN] on the forward reduced distance. Localized monotonicity formulae on entropy and forward reduced volume are also derived.

On a K-unstable toric variety we show the existence of an optimal destabilising convex function. We show that if this is piecewise linear then it gives rise to a decomposition into semistable pieces analogous to the Harder-Narasimhan filtration of an unstable vector bundle. We also show that if the Calabi flow exists for all time on a toric variety then it minimizes the Calabi functional. In this case the infimum of the Calabi functional is given by the supremum of the normalized Futaki invariants over all destabilising test-configurations, as predicted by a conjecture of Donaldson.