6 Toric Degenerations of Git Quotients , Chow Quotients

The moduli spaceM0,n plays important roles in algebraic geometry and theoretical physics. Yet, some basic properties of M 0,n still remain open. For example, M0,n is rational and nearly toric (that is, it contains a toric variety as a Zariski open subset), but it is not a toric variety itself starting from dimension 2 (n ≥ 5). So, a basic question is: Can it be degenerated flatly to a projective toric variety? Finding toric degeneration is important because many calculations may then be done in terms of combinatorial data extracted out of polytopes and/or fans. The main purpose of this note is to answer the above question in affirmative.