We give an explicit formula for the holonomy of the orientation bundle of a family of real
Cauchy–Riemann operators. A special case of this formula resolves the orientability
question for spaces of maps from Riemann surfaces with Lagrangian boundary condition.
As a corollary, we show that the local system of orientations on the moduli space of
–holomorphic
maps from a bordered Riemann surface to a symplectic manifold is isomorphic to the
pullback of a local system defined on the product of the Lagrangian and its
free loop space. As another corollary, we show that certain natural bundles
over these moduli spaces have the same local systems of orientations as the
moduli spaces themselves (this is a prerequisite for integrating the Euler
classes of these bundles). We will apply these conclusions in future papers
to construct and compute open Gromov–Witten invariants in a number of
settings.
Keywords
orientability, moduli spaces, open Gromov–Witten theory
