Geometry of complex Monge-Ampere equations

The Kähler-Ricci flow is studied on compact Kähler manifolds with positive first Chern class, where it reduces to a parabolic complex Monge-Ampere equation. It is shown that the flow converges to a Kähler-Einstein metric if the curvature remains bounded along the flow, and if the manifold is stable in an algebro-geometric sense. On a compact Calabi-Yau manifold there is a unique Ricci-flat Kähler metric in each Kähler cohomology class, produced by Yau solving a complex Monge-Ampere equation. The behaviour of these metrics when the class degenerates to the boundary of the Kähler cone is studied. The problem splits into two cases, according to whether the total volume goes to zero or not. On a compact symplectic four-manifold Donaldson has proposed an analog of the complex Monge-Ampère equation, the Calabi-Yau equation. If solved, it would lead to new results in symplectic topology. We solve the equation when the manifold is nonnegatively curved, and reduce the general case to bounding an integral of a scalar function.