Relations in the cohomology ring of the moduli space of flat $SO(2n+1)$-connections on a Riemann surface

Abstract

We consider the moduli space of flat $SO(2n+1)$-connections (up to gauge transformations) on a Riemann surface, with fixed holonomy around a marked point. There are natural line bundles over this moduli space; we construct geometric representatives for the Chern classes of these line bundles, and prove that the ring generated by these Chern classes vanishes below the dimension of the moduli space, generalising a conjecture of Newstead.

30 pages, 10 figures. Several corrections and clarifications; final version