Let $\sigma $ be a stability condition on the bounded derived category $D^b({\mathop{\mathrm {Coh}}\nolimits } W)$ of a Calabi–Yau threefold W and $\mathcal {M}$ a moduli stack parametrizing $\sigma $ -semistable objects of fixed topological type. We define generalized Donaldson–Thomas invariants which act as virtual counts of objects in $\mathcal {M}$ , fully generalizing the approach introduced by Kiem, Li and the author in the case of semistable sheaves. We construct an associated proper Deligne–Mumford stack $\widetilde {\mathcal {M}}^{\mathbb {C}^{\ast }}$ , called the $\mathbb {C}^{\ast }$ -rigidified intrinsic stabilizer reduction of $\mathcal {M}$ , with an induced semiperfect obstruction theory of virtual dimension zero, and define the generalized Donaldson–Thomas invariant via Kirwan blowups to be the degree of the associated virtual cycle $[\widetilde {\mathcal {M}}]^{\mathrm {vir}} \in A_0(\widetilde {\mathcal {M}})$ . This stays invariant under deformations of the complex structure of W. Applications include Bridgeland stability, polynomial stability, Gieseker and slope stability.

We describe birational models and decide the rationality/unirationality of moduli spaces $\cal A$d (and $\cal A$levd) of (1, d)-polarized Abelian surfaces (with canonical level structure, respectively) for small values of d. The projective lines identified in the rational/unirational moduli spaces correspond to pencils of Abelian surfaces traced on nodal threefolds living naturally in the corresponding ambient projective spaces, and whose small resolutions are new Calabi–Yau threefolds with Euler characteristic zero.

Working over the complex numbers, we study curves lying in a complete intersection K3 surface contained in a (nodal) complete intersection Calabi–Yau threefold. Under certain generality assumptions, we show that the linear system of curves in the surface is a connected componend of the the Hilbert scheme of the threefold. In the case of genus one, we deduce the existence of infinitesimally rigid embeddings of elliptic curves of arbitrary degree in the general complete intersection Calabi–Yau threefold.