DEGENERATION OF INTERMEDIATE JACOBIANS AND THE TORELLI THEOREM

Mumford and Newstead generalized the classical Torelli theorem to higher rank, i.e. a smooth, projective curve X is uniquely determined by the second intermediate Jacobian of the moduli space of stable rank 2 bundles on X, with fixed odd degree determinant. In this article we prove the analogous result in the case X is an irreducible nodal curve with one node. As a byproduct, we obtain the degeneration of the second intermediate Jacobians and the associated Neron model of a family of such moduli spaces.