In this paper we classify the topological invariants of the possible branch loci of a smooth double cover $f:X\rightarrow Y$ of a K3 surface $Y$. We describe some geometric properties of $X$ which depend on the properties of the branch locus. We give explicit examples of surfaces $X$ with Kodaira dimension 1 and 2 obtained as double cover of K3 surfaces and we describe some of them as bidouble cover of rational surfaces. Then, we classify the K3 surfaces which admit smooth double covers $X$ satisfying certain conditions; under these conditions the surface $X$ is of general type, $h^{1,0}(X)=0$ and $h^{2,0}(X)=2$. We discuss the variation of the Hodge structure of $H^2(X,\mathbb{Z})$ for some of these surfaces $X$.
This paper computes the Galois group of the Galois cover of the composition of an étale double cover of a cyclic $p$-gonal cover for any prime $p$. Moreover a relation between some of its Prym varieties and the Jacobian of a subcover is given. In a sense this generalizes the trigonal construction.
We show that three numerical semigroups <5,6,7,8>, <3,7,8 > and <3,5> are of double covering type, i.e., the Weierstrass semigroups of ramification points on double covers of curves. Combining this with the results of Oliveira-Pimentel and Komeda we can determine the Weierstrass semigroups of the ramification points on double covers of genus two curves.
We prove the relation between the Hodge structure of the double cover of a nonsingular cubic surface branched along its Hessian and the Hodge structure of the triple cover of the ambient projective space branched along the cubic surface. And we introduce a method to study the infinitesimal variations of Hodge structure of the double cover of the cubic surface. Using these results, we compute the Néron-Severi lattices for the double cover of a generic cubic surface and the Fermat cubic surface.
Let C be a complete non-singular irreducible curve of genus 4 over an algebraically closed field of characteristic 0. We determine all possible Weierstrass semigroups of ramification points on double covers of C which have genus greater than 11. Moreover, we construct double covers with ramification points whose Weierstrass semigroups are the possible ones.
We prove that a double cover of $\mathbb{P}^2$ ramified along a general smooth curve B of degree $2s$, for $s \geq 3$, supports a rank 2 special Ulrich bundle.
Following an idea of Ciliberto we show that double covers of projective r-space branched over an hypersurface of degree 2d are unirational provided r is sufficiently big with respect to d.
We study a class of Calabi-Yau varieties that can be represented as a non-singular model of a double covering of $\mathbb P^3$ branched along certain octic surfaces. We compute Euler numbers of all constructed examples and describe their resolution of singularities.
We explain a general construction of double covers of quadratic degeneracy loci and Lagrangian intersection loci based on reflexive sheaves. We relate the double covers of quadratic degeneracy loci to the Stein factorizations of the relative Hilbert schemes of linear spaces of the corresponding quadric fibrations. We give a criterion for these double covers to be nonsingular. As applications of these results, we show that the double covers of the EPW sextics obtained by our construction give O'Grady's double EPW sextics and that an analogous construction gives Iliev-Kapustka-Kapustka-Ranestad'…
We show that the coarse moduli space $\cR_5$ of étale double covers of curves of genus~5 over the complex numbers is unirational. We give two slightly different arguments, one purely geometric and the other more computational.
Let X be a smooth curve of genus g. When pi>=3g and d>=pi-2g+1 we show the existence of a double covering gamma:C-->X where C a smooth curve of genus pi with a base-point-free pencil of degree d which is not the pull-back of a pencil on X.
Let $Y$ be a smooth Enriques surface. A $K3$ carpet on $Y$ is a locally Cohen-Macaulay double structure on $Y$ with the same invariants as a smooth $K3$ surface (i.e., regular and with trivial canonical sheaf). The surface $Y$ possesses an étale $K3$ double cover $X \oversetπ \longrightarrow Y$. We prove that $π$ can be deformed to a family $\SX \longrightarrow \mathbf P^N_{T^*}$ of projective embeddings of $K3$ surfaces and that any projective $K3$ carpet on $Y$ arises from such a family as the flat limit of smooth, embedded $K3$ surfaces.
The goal of this paper is to give a method to compute the space of infinitesimal deformations of a double cover of a smooth algebraic variety. The space of all infinitesimal deformations has a representation as a direct sum of two subspaces. One is isomorphic to the space of simultaneous deformations of the branch locus and the base of the double covering. The second summand is the subspace of deformations of the double covering which induce trivial deformations of the branch divisor. The main result of the paper is a description of the effect of imposing singularities in the branch locus. As …
We construct a deformation family for each of the 34 Hilbert series of index 2 Fano 3-folds. In 18 cases we construct two different families, distinguished by the topology of their general members.
We investigate the nef cone spanned by the diagonal and the fibre classes of second symmetric product of a curve of genus $g$. This 2-dimensional nef cone gives a characterization of double covers of curves of genus $\le \frac{g-1}{8}$. This is a generalization of a result by Debarre.
If $X$ is a smooth curve such that the minimal degree of its plane models is not too small compared with its genus, then $X$ has been known to be a double cover of another smooth curve $Y$ under some mild condition on the genera. However there are no results yet for the minimal degrees of plane models of double covers except some special cases. In this paper, we give upper and lower bounds for the minimal degree of plane models of the double cover $X$ in terms of the gonality of the base curve $Y$ and the genera of $X$ and $Y$. In particular, the upper bound equals to the lower bound in case $…
EPW-sextics are special 4-dimensional sextic hypersurfaces (with 20 moduli) which come equipped with a double cover. We analyze the double cover of EPW-sextics parametrized by a certain prime divisor in the moduli space. We associate to the generic sextic parametrized by that divisor a K3 surface of genus 6 and we show that the double epw sextic is a contraction of the Hilbert square of the K3. This result has two consequences. First it gives a new proof of the following result of ours: smooth double EPW-sextics form a locally complete family of hyperkaehler projective deformations of the Hilb…
In this paper, we prove the irreducibility of the monodromy action on the anti-invariant part of the vanishing cohomology on a double cover of a very general element in an ample hypersurface of a complex smooth projective variety branched at an ample divisor. As an application, we study dominant rational maps from a double cover of a very general surface $S$ of degree$\geq 7$ in ${\mathbb P}^3$ branched at a very general quadric surface to smooth projective surfaces $Z$. Our method combines the classification theory of algebraic surfaces, deformation theory, and Hodge theory.
In 2017, Catanese--Perroni gave a natural correspondence between the Picard group of a double cover and a set of pairs of a vector bundle of rank two and a certain morphism of vector bundles on the base space. In this paper, we describe the group structure of the latter set induced from the Picard group in terms of transition functions of vector bundles of rank two. This study is derived from the study of the embedded topology of plane curves. It also proposes approaches to the study of Picard groups of double covers, and to the construction of vector bundles of rank two.
We study Shimura curves of PEL type in the space of polarised abelian varieties $A^δ_p$ generically contained in the ramified Prym locus. We generalise to ramified double covers, the construction done in [10] in the unramified case and in the case of two ramification points. Namely, we construct families of double covers which are compatible with a fixed group action on the base curve. We only consider the case of one-dimensional families and where the quotient of the base curve by the group is ${\mathbb P}^1$. Using computer algebra we obtain 184 Shimura curves contained in the (ramified) Pry…
In this paper we study the automorphisms group of some $K3$ surfaces which are double covers of the projective plane ramified over a smooth sextic plane curve. More precisely, we study the case of a $K3$ surface of Picard rank two such that there is a rational curve of degree $d$ which is tangent to the sextic in $d$ points.
We construct explicitly a finite cover of the moduli stack of compact Riemann surfaces with a given group of symmetries by a smooth quasi-projective variety.
We prove that a general Fano fibration $π\colon V\to {\mathbb P}^1$, the fiber of which is a double Fano hypersurface of index 1, is birationally superrigid provided it is sufficiently twisted over the base. In particular, on $V$ there are no other structures of a rationally connected fibration. The proof is based on the method of maximal singularities.
Given a degree one del Pezzo surface with canonical singularities, the linear series generated by twice the anti-canonical divisor exhibits the surface as the double cover of the quadric cone branched along a sextic curve. It is natural to ask if this description extends to the boundary of a compactification of the moduli space of degree one del Pezzo surfaces. The goal of this paper is to show that this is indeed the case. In particular, we give an explicit classification of the boundary of the moduli space of anti-canonically polarized broken del Pezzo surfaces of degree one as double covers…
Iterating the procedure of making a double cover over a given variety, we construct large families of smooth higher-dimensional Fano varieties of index 1. These varieties can be realized as complete intersections in various weighted projective spaces. A generic variety in these families is proved to be birationally superrigid; in particular, it admits no non-trivial structures of a fibration into rationally connected (or uniruled) varieties, it is non-rational and its groups of birational and biregular self-maps coincide.
Let $X$ be a smooth algebraic curve. Suppose that there exists a triple covering $f : X \to Y$ where $Y$ is a smooth algebraic curve. In this paper, we investigate the existence of morphisms from $X$ to the projective line $\mathbf{P}^1$ which do not factor through the covering $f$. For this purpose, we generalize the classical results of Maroni concerning base-point-free pencils on trigonal curves to the case of triple covers of arbitrary smooth irrational curves.
We complete the study of birational geometry of Fano fiber spaces $π\colon V\to {\mathbb P}^1$, the fiber of which is a Fano double hypersurface of index 1. For each family of these varieties we either prove birational rigidity or produce explicitly non-trivial structures of Fano fiber spaces. A new linear method of studying movable systems on Fano fiber spaces $V/{\mathbb P}^1$ is developed.
For every supersingular $K3$ surface $X$ in characteristic 2, there exists a homogeneous polynomial $G$ of degree 6 such that $X$ is birational to the purely inseparable double cover of a projective plane defined by $w^2=G$. We present an algorithm to calculate from $G$ a set of generators of the numerical Néron-Severi lattice of $X$. As an application, we investigate the stratification defined by the Artin invariant on a moduli space of supersingular $K3$ surfaces of degree 2 in characteristic 2.
We study a double cover $ψ:X\to V\subset\mathbb{P}^{n}$ branched over a smooth divisor $R\subset V$ such that $R$ is cut on $V$ by a hypersurface of degree $2(n-\mathrm{deg}(V))$, where $n\geqslant 8$ and $V$ is a smooth hypersurface of degree 3 or 4. We prove that $X$ is nonrational and birationally superrigid.
We study the projective normality of a minimal surface $X$ which is a ramified double covering over a rational surface $S$ with $\dim|-K_S|\ge 1$. In particular Horikawa surfaces, the minimal surfaces of general type with $K^2_X=2p_g(X)-4$, are of this type, up to resolution of singularities. Let $π$ be the covering map from $X$ to $S$. We show that the $\mathbb{Z}_2$-invariant adjoint divisors $K_X+rπ^*A$ are normally generated, where the integer $r\ge 3$ and $A$ is an ample divisor on $S$.
We prove that ribbons, i.e. double structures associated with a line bundle $\SE$ over its reduced support, a smooth irreducible projective curve of arbitrary genus, are smoothable if their arithmetic genus is greater than or equal to $3 $ and the support curve possesses a smooth irreducible double cover with trace zero module $\SE$. The method we use is based on the infinitesimal techniques that we develop to show that if the support curve admits such a double cover then every embedded ribbon over the curve is ``infinitesimally smoothable'', i.e. the ribbon can be obtained as central fiber of…
In this paper we classify the elliptic fibrations on K3 surfaces which are the double cover of a blow up of $\mathbb{P}^2$ branched along rational curves and we give equations for many of these elliptic fibrations. Thus we obtain a classification of the van Geemen--Sarti involutions (which are symplectic involutions induced by a translation by a 2-torsion section on an elliptic fibration) on such a surface. Each van Geemen--Sarti involution induces a 2-isogeny between two K3 surfaces, which is described in this paper.
Let $ϕ: X \to \mathbb P^n$ be a double cover branched along a smooth hypersurface of degree $2m, 2 \leq m \leq n-1$. We study the varieties of minimal rational tangents $\mathcal C_x \subset \mathbb P T_x(X)$ at a general point $x$ of $X$. We describe the homogeneous ideal of $\mathcal C_x$ and show that the projective isomorphism type of $\mathcal C_x$ varies in a maximal way as $x$ varies over general points of $X$. Our description of the ideal of $\mathbb C_x$ implies a certain rigidity property of the covering morphism $ϕ$. As an application of this rigidity, we show that any finite morphi…
In this paper we construct Shimura subvarieties of dimension bigger than one of the moduli space of polarised abelian varieties of a given dimension, which are generically contained in the Pym loci of (ramified) double covers. The idea is to adapt the techniques already used to construct Shimura curves in the Prym loci to the higher dimensional case, namely to use families of Galois covers of the projective line. The case of abelian covers is treated in detail, since in this case it is possible to make explicit computations that allow to verify a sufficient condition for such a family to yield…
In this paper, we show that if $X$ is a smooth variety of general type of dimension $m \geq 2$, for which its canonical map induces a double cover onto $Y$, where $Y$ is a projective bundle over $\mathbf P^1$, or onto a projective space or onto a quadric hypersurface, embedded by a complete linear series, then the general deformation of the canonical morphism of $X$ again is canonical and again induces a double cover. The second part of the article deals with the existence or non existence of canonical double structures on rational varieties. The negative result in this article has consequence…
In this article we classify quadruple Galois canonical covers of smooth surfaces of minimal degree. The classification shows that they are either non-simple cyclic covers or bi-double covers. If they are bi-double then they are all fiber products of double covers. We construct examples to show that all the possibilities in the classification do exist. There are implications of this classification that include the existence of families with unbounded geometric genus and families with unbounded irregularity, in sharp contrast with the case of double and triple canonical covers. Together with the…
Let f: X->B be a fibred surface of genus g whose general fibre is a double cover of a smooth curve of genus gamma. We show that, for g > 4gamma+1, the number 4(g-1)/(g-gamma) is a sharp lower bound for the slope of f, proving a conjecture of Barja. Moreover, we give a characterisation of the fibred surfaces that reach the bound. In the case g = 4gamma+1 we obtain the same sharp bound under the assumption that the involutions on the general fibres glue to a global involution on X.
In this note we look at the moduli space $\cR_{3,2}$ of double covers of genus three curves, branched along 4 distinct points. This space was studied by Bardelli, Ciliberto and Verra. It admits a dominating morphism $\cR_{3,2} \to {\mathcal A}_4$ to Siegel space. We show that there is a birational model of $\cR_{3,2}$ as a group quotient of a product of two Grassmannian varieties. This gives a proof of the unirationality of $\cR_{3,2}$ and hence a new proof for the unirationality of ${\mathcal A}_4$.
We derive a formula for the virtual class of the moduli space of rubber maps to $[\mathbb{P}^1/G]$ pushed forward to the moduli space of stable maps to $BG$. As an application, we show that the Gromov-Witten theory of $[\mathbb{P}^1/G]$ relative to $0$ and $\infty$ are determined by known calculations.
We investigate the universal Jacobian of degree n line bundles over the Hurwitz stack of double covers of P^1 by a curve of genus g. Our main results are: the construction of a smooth, irreducible, universally closed (but not separated) moduli compactification of this universal Jacobian; a description of the global geometry and moduli properties of these stacks; and a computation of the Picard groups of these stacks in the cases when n-g is even. An important ingredient of our work is the parametrization of line bundles on double covers by binary quadratic forms. This parametrization generaliz…
We study the Seshadri constants of cyclic coverings of smooth surfaces. The existence of an automorphism on these surfaces can be used to produce Seshadri exceptional curves. We give a bound for multiple Seshadri constants on cyclic coverings of surfaces with Picard number 1. Morevoer, we apply this method to $n$-cyclic coverings of the projective plane. When $2\leq n\leq 9$, explicit values are obtained. We relate this problem with the Nagata conjecture.
The presented paper is a continuation of the series of papers arXiv:1810.00606 and arXiv:1903.09373. In this paper, utilizing Batyrev and Borisov's duality construction on nef-partitions, we generalize the recipe in arXiv:1810.00606 and arXiv:1903.09373 to construct a pair of singular double cover Calabi--Yau varieties $(Y,Y^{\vee})$ over toric manifolds and compute their topological Euler characteristics and Hodge numbers. In the $3$-dimensional cases, we show that $(Y,Y^{\vee})$ forms a topological mirror pair, i.e., $h^{p,q}(Y)=h^{3-p,q}(Y^{\vee})$ for all $p,q$.
A collection $S = \{D_1,\ldots, D_n\}$ of divisors in a smooth variety $X$ is an {\em arrangement} if intersections of all subsets of $S$ are smooth. We show that a double cover of $X$ ramified on an arrangement has a crepant resolution under additional hypotheses. Namely, we assume that all intersection components that change the canonical divisor when blown up satisfy are {\em splayed}, a property of the tangent spaces of the components first studied by Faber. This strengthens a result of Cynk and Hulek, which requires a stronger hypothesis on the intersection components. Further, we study t…
We classify purely inseparable morphisms of degree $p$ between rational double points (RDPs) in characteristic $p > 0$. Using such morphisms, we refine a result of Artin that any RDP admits a finite smooth covering.
We prove that every smooth Fano threefold from the family No 2.8 is K-stable. Such a Fano threefold is a double cover of the blow-up of $\mathbb{P}^3$ at one point branched along an anti-canonical divisor.
We study the behavior of theta characteristics on an algebraic curve under the specialization map to a tropical curve. We show that each effective theta characteristic on the tropical curve is the specialization of $2^{g-1}$ even theta characteristics and $2^{g-1}$ odd theta characteristics. We then study the relationship between unramified double covers of a tropical curve and its theta characteristics, and use this to define the tropical Prym variety.
This paper describes D-brane probes of theories arising in abelian gauged linear sigma models (GLSMs) describing branched double covers and noncommutative resolutions thereof, via nonperturbative effects rather than as the critical locus of a superpotential. As these theories can be described as IR limits of Landau-Ginzburg models, technically this paper is an exercise in utilizing (sheafy) matrix factorizations. For Landau-Ginzburg models which are believed to flow in the IR to smooth branched double covers, our D-brane probes recover the structure of the branched double cover (and flat nontr…
