Tautological systems are Picard-Fuchs type systems arising from varieties with large symmetry. In this survey, we discuss recent progress on the study of tautological systems. This includes tautological systems for vector bundles, a new construction of Jacobian rings for homogenous vector bundles, and relations between period integrals and zeta functions.

Tautological systems developed in [8, 9] are Picard-Fuchs type systems to study period integrals of complete intersections in Fano varieties. We generalize tautological systems to zero loci of global sections of vector bundles. In particular, we obtain similar criterion as in [8, 9] about holonomicity and regularity of the systems. We also prove solution rank formulas and geometric realizations of solutions following the work on hypersurfaces in homogeneous varieties [4].

This is an expanded version of the third author's lecture in String-Math 2015 at Sanya. It summarizes some of our works in quantum cohomology. After reviewing the quantum Lefschetz and quantum Leray--Hirsch, we discuss their applications to the functoriality properties under special smooth flops, flips and blow-ups. Finally, for conifold transitions of Calabi--Yau 3-folds, formulations for small resolutions (blow-ups along Weil divisors) are sketched.

Let X be an equivariant embedding of a connected reductive group X over an algebraically closed field X of positive characteristic. Let X denote a Borel subgroup of X . A X -Schubert variety in X is a subvariety of the form $\diag (G)\cdot V $, where X is a X -orbit closure in X . In the case where X is the wonderful compactification of a group of adjoint type, the X -Schubert varieties are the closures of Lusztig's X -stable pieces. We prove that X admits a Frobenius splitting which is compatible with all X -Schubert varieties. Moreover, when X is smooth, projective and toroidal, then any X -Schubert variety in X admits a stable Frobenius splitting along an ample divisors. Although this indicates that X -Schubert varieties have nice singularities we present an example of a non-normal X -Schubert variety in the wonderful compactification of a group of type X . Finally we also extend the Frobenius splitting results to the more general class of X -Schubert varieties.

This is the first of a sequence of papers proving the quantum invariance under ordinary flops over an arbitrary smooth base. In this first part, we determine the defect of the cup product under the canonical correspondence and show that it is corrected by the small quantum product attached to the extremal ray. We then perform various reductions to reduce the problem to the local models. In Part II, we develop a quantum Leray--Hirsch theorem and use it to show that the big quantum cohomology ring is invariant under analytic continuations in the Kähler moduli space for ordinary flops of splitting type. In Part III, together with F. Qu, we remove the splitting condition by developing a quantum splitting principle, and hence solve the problem completely.