Beauville asked if a compact Kähler manifold with split tangent bundle has a universal covering that is a product of manifolds. We use Mori theory and elementary results about holomorphic foliations to study this problem for projective uniruled varieties. In particular we obtain an affirmative answer for rationally connected varieties in any dimension and uniruled varieties in dimension 4.
In this note we characterize polarized parallel transport operators on irreducible holomorphic symplectic varieties which are deformations of generalized Kummer varieties. We then apply such characterization to show the existence of ample uniruled divisors on these varieties and derive some interesting consequences on their Chow group of 0-cycles.
In this paper we show that a uniruled manifold with a split tangent bundle admits almost holomorphic fibrations that are related to the splitting. We analyse these fibrations in detail in several special cases, this yields new results about the integrability of the direct factors and the universal covering of the manifold.
It is known that projective minimal models satisfy the celebrated Miyaoka-Yau inequalities. In this article, we extend these inequalities to the set of all smooth, projective and non-uniruled varieties.
A classical result of Miyanishi-Sugie and Keel-McKernan asserts that for smooth affine surfaces, affine-uniruledness is equivalent to affine-ruledness, both properties being in fact equivalent to the negativity of the logarithmic Kodaira dimension. Here we show in contrast that starting from dimension three, there exists smooth affine varieties which are affine-uniruled but not affine-ruled.
We prove that smooth, projective, $K$-trivial, weakly ordinary varieties over a perfect field of characteristic $p>0$ are not geometrically uniruled. We also show a singular version of our theorem, which is sharp in multiple aspects. Our work, together with Langer's results, implies that varieties of the above type have strongly semistable tangent bundles with respect to any polarization.
A strongly reflective modular form with respect to an orthogonal group of signature (2,n) determines a Lorentzian Kac--Moody algebra. We find a new geometric application of such modular forms: we prove that if the weight is larger than n then the corresponding modular variety is uniruled. We also construct new reflective modular forms and thus provide new examples of uniruled moduli spaces of lattice polarised K3 surfaces. Finally we prove that the moduli space of Kummer surfaces associated to (1,21)-polarised abelian surfaces is uniruled.
We develop criteria for affine varieties to admit uniruled subvarieties of certain dimensions. The measurements are from long exact sequences of versions of symplectic cohomology, which is a Hamiltonian Floer theory for some open symplectic manifolds including affine varieties. Symplectic cohomology is hard to compute, in general. However, certain vanishing and invariance properties of symplectic cohomology can be used to prove that our criteria for finding uniruled subvarieties hold in some cases. We provide applications of the criteria in birational geometry of log pairs in the direction of …
Using the $\sharp$-minimal model program of uniruled varieties we show that for any pair $(X, \H)$ consisting of a reduced and irreducible variety $X$ of dimension $k \geq 3$ and a globally generated big line bundle $\H$ on $X$ with $d:= \H^k$ and $n:= h^0(X, \H)-1$ such that $d<2(n-k)-4$, then $X$ is uniruled of $\H$-degree one, except if $(k,d,n)=(3,27,19)$ and a ${\sharp}$-minimal model of $(X, \H)$ is $(\PP^3,Ø_{\PP^3}(3))$. We also show that the bound is optimal for threefolds.
We show that polarized endomorphisms of rationally connected threefolds with at worst terminal singularities are equivariantly built up from those on Q-Fano threefolds, Gorenstein log del Pezzo surfaces and P^1. Similar results are obtained for polarized endomorphisms of uniruled threefolds and fourfolds. As a consequence, we show that every smooth Fano threefold with a polarized endomorphism of degree > 1, is rational.
We prove the Jordan property for groups of bimeromorphic selfmaps of three-dimensional compact Kähler varieties of non-negative Kodaira dimension and positive irregularity.
We prove the Nonvanishing conjecture for uniruled projective log canonical pairs of dimension $n$, assuming the Nonvanishing conjecture for smooth projective varieties in dimension $n-1$. We also show that the existence of good minimal models for non-uniruled projective klt pairs in dimension $n$ implies the existence of good minimal models for projective log canonical pairs in dimension $n$.
For a uniruled projective manifold, we prove that a general rational curve of minimal degree through a general point is uniquely determined by its tangent vector. As applications, among other things we give a new proof, using no Lie theory, of our earlier result that a holomorphic map from a rational homogeneous space of Picard number 1 onto a projective manifold different from the projective space must be a biholomorphic map.
Here we investigate the birational geometry of projective varieties of arbitrary dimension having defective higher secant varieties. We apply the classical tool of tangential projections and we determine natural conditions for uniruledness, rational connectivity, and rationality.
We study pluricanonical systems on smooth projective varieties of positive Kodaira dimension, following the approach of Hacon-McKernan, Takayama and Tsuji succesfully used in the case of varieties of general type. We prove a uniformity result for the Iitaka fibration of smooth projective varieties of positive Kodaira dimension, provided that the base of the Iitaka fibration is not uniruled, the variation of the fibration is maximal, and the generic fiber has a good minimal model.
This is an expanded and updated version of a lecture series I gave at Seoul National University in September 1997. It is in some sense an update of the 1979 Griffiths and Harris paper with a similar title. I discuss: Homogeneous varieties, Topology and consequences Projective differential invariants, Varieties with degenerate Gauss images, When can a uniruled variety be smooth?, Dual varieties, Linear systems of bounded and constant rank, Secant and tangential varieties, Systems of quadrics with tangential defects, Recognizing uniruled varieties, Recognizing intersections of quadrics, Recogniz…
A group $G$ is called Jordan if there is a positive integer $J=J_G$ such that every finite subgroup $\mathcal{B}$ of $G$ contains a commutative subgroup $\mathcal{A}\subset \mathcal{B}$ such that $\mathcal{A}$ is normal in $\mathcal{B}$ and the index $[\mathcal{B}:\mathcal{A}] \le J$ (V.L. Popov). In this paper we deal with Jordaness properties of the groups $Bir(X)$ of birational automorphisms of irreducible smooth projective varieties $X$ over an algebraically closed field of characteristic zero. It is known (Yu. Prokhorov - C. Shramov) that $Bir(X)$ is Jordan if $X$ is non-uniruled. On the …
We characterize Kaehler manifolds with trivial logarithmic tangent bundle (with respect to a divisor D) as a class of certain compatifications of complex semi-tori.
We study the geometry of projective manifolds whose tangent bundles are nef on sufficiently general curves (i.e. the tangent bundle is generically nef) and show that manifolds whose anticanonical bundles are semi-ample have this property. Furthermore we introduce a notion of sufficient nefness and investigate the relation with manifolds whose anticanonical bundles are nef.
Suppose that A and B are symplectomorphic smooth affine varieties. If A is acylic of dimension 2 then B has the same log Kodaira dimension as A. If the dimension of A is 3, has log Kodaira dimension 2 and satisfies some other conditions then B cannot be of log general type. We also show that if A and B are symplectomorphic affine varieties of any dimension then any compactification of A by a projective variety is uniruled if and only if any such compactification of B is uniruled.
This survey paper discusses some of the recent progress in the study of rational curves on algebraic varieties. It was written for the survey volume of the priority programme "Global Methods in Complex Geometry", supported by the DFG. To start, we discuss existence results for rational curves on foliated manifolds. We construct the tangent morphism, define the variety of minimal rational tangents (VMRT) and name a number of results that show that many of the geometry properies of a uniruled variety are encoded in the projective geometry of the VMRT. The results are then applied in two differen…
We give a simple combinatorial proof of the toric version of Mori's theorem that the only $n$-dimensional smooth projective varieties with ample tangent bundle are the projective spaces $\mathbb{P}^n$.
The main goal of this paper is to prove the polystability of the logarithmic tangent sheaf $\mathscr T_X(-D)$ of a log canonical pair $(X,D)$ whose canonical bundle $K_X+D$ is ample, generalizing in a significant way a theorem of Enoki. We apply this result and the techniques involved in its proof to get a version of this theorem for stable varieties (the higher dimensional analogue of Deligne-Mumford's stable curves) and to prove the polystability with respect to any polarization of the tangent sheaf of a singular Calabi-Yau variety.
In this paper, we establish the following version at infinity of Whitney's theorem [6, 7]: Geometric and algebraic tangent cones at infinity of complex algebraic varieties coincide. The proof of this fact is based on a geometric characterization of geometric tangent cones at infinity and using the global Łojasiewicz inequality with explicit exponents for complex algebraic varieties. We also show that tangent cones at infinity of complex algebraic varieties can be computed using Gröbner bases.
We formulate the equivalence problem, in the sense of E. Cartan, for families of minimal rational curves on uniruled projective manifolds. An important invariant of this equivalence problem is the variety of minimal rational tangents. We study the case when varieties of minimal rational tangents at general points form an isotrivial family. The main question in this case is for which projective variety $Z$, a family of minimal rational curves with $Z$-isotrivial varieties of minimal rational tangents is locally equivalent to the flat model. We show that this is the case when $Z$ satisfies certa…
I prove a crystalline characterization of abelian varieties in characteristic $p>0$ amongst the class of varieties with trivial tangent bundle. I show using my characterization that a smooth, projective, ordinary variety with trivial tangent bundle is an abelian variety if and only if its second crystalline cohomology is torsion free. I also show that a conjecture of Ke-Zheng Li about characteristic $p>0$ varieties with trivial tangent bundles is true for surfaces. I give a new proof of a result of Li and prove a refinement of it. Based on my characterization of abelian varieties I propose mod…
This paper generalises Mori's famous theorem about "Projective manifolds with ample tangent bundles" to normal projective varieties in the following way: A normal projective variety over $\mathbb{C}$ with ample tangent sheaf is isomorphic to the complex projective space.
Recently, Kanemitsu has discovered a counterexample to the long-standing conjecture that the tangent bundle of a Fano manifold of Picard number one is (semi)stable. His counterexample is a smooth horospherical variety. There is a weaker conjecture that the tangent bundle of a Fano manifold of Picard number one is simple. We prove that this weaker conjecture is valid for smooth horospherical varieties of Picard number one. Our proof follows from the existence of an irreducible family of unbendable rational curves whose tangent vectors span the tangent spaces of the horospherical variety at gene…
We describe the stratification by tensor rank of the points belonging to the tangent developable of any Segre variety. We give algorithms to compute the rank and a decomposition of a tensor belonging to the secant variety of lines of any Segre variety. We prove Comon's conjecture on the rank of symmetric tensors for those tensors belonging to tangential varieties to Veronese varieties.
We determine the stability/instability of the tangent bundles of the Fano varieties in a certain class of two orbit varieties, which are classified by Pasquier in 2009. As a consequence, we show that some of these varieties admit unstable tangent bundles, which disproves a conjecture on stability of tangent bundles of Fano manifolds.
We study the positivity of exterior powers of the tangent sheaf on toric varieties in order to generalize results by Campana and Peternell about 3-folds with nef second exterior power of the tangent bundle. Using the theory of equivariant vector bundles and the toric MMP, we establish in the smooth case a criterion for the positivity of $Λ^m\mathcal T_X$ in terms of wall relations. As an application, we classify smooth toric varieties of arbitrary dimension $n\ge3$ with $Λ^2\mathcal T_X$ nef and those of dimension $n\ge 4$ with $Λ^3\mathcal T_X$ ample.
Following Contou-Carrere [CC], we consider the Bott-Samelson resolution of a Schubert variety as a variety of galleries in the Tits building associated to the situation. We prove that the rational smoothness of a Schubert variety can be expressed in terms of a subspace of the Zariski tangent space called, the combinatorial tangent space. For this, we use a characterization of rational smoothness of a Schubert variety introduced by Carrell and Peterson [CP].
We compute the dimensions of all the secant varieties to the tangential varieties of all Segre-Veronese surfaces. We exploit the typical approach of computing the Hilbert function of special 0-dimensional schemes on projective plane by using a new degeneration technique.
For a hypersurface in a projective space, we consider the set of pairs of a point and a line in the projective space such that the line intersects the hypersurface at the point with a fixed multiplicity. We prove that this set of pairs forms a smooth variety for a general hypersurface.
We give a combinatorial criterion for the tangent bundle on a smooth toric variety to be stable with respect to a given polarisation in terms of the corresponding lattice polytope. Furthermore, we show that for a smooth toric surface and a smooth toric variety of Picard rank 2, there exists an ample line bundle with respect to which the tangent bundle is stable if and only if it is an iterated blow-up of projective space.
Let $X$ be a smooth projective variety defined over an algebraically closed field of positive characteristic $p$ whose tangent bundle is nef. We prove that $X$ admits a smooth morphism $X \to M$ such that the fibers are Fano varieties with nef tangent bundle and $T_M$ is numerically flat. We also prove that extremal contractions exist as smooth morphisms. As an application, we prove that, if the Frobenius morphism can be lifted modulo $p^2$, then $X$ admits, up to a finite étale Galois cover, a smooth morphism onto an ordinary abelian variety whose fibers are products of projective spaces.
We give an introduction to the theory of varieties of minimal rational tangents, emphasizing its aspect as a fusion of algebraic geometry and differential geometry, more specifically, a fusion of Mori geometry of minimal rational curves and Cartan geometry of cone structures.
Let $X$ be a nonsingular complex projective toric variety. We address the question of semi-stability as well as stability for the tangent bundle $T{X}$. In particular, a complete answer is given when $X$ is a Fano toric variety of dimension four with Picard number at most two, complementing earlier work of Nakagawa. We also give an infinite set of examples of Fano toric varieties for which $TX$ is unstable; the dimensions of this collection of varieties are unbounded. Our method is based on the equivariant approach initiated by Klyachko and developed further by Perling and Kool.
Let $X$ be a complex smooth projective variety such that the exterior power of the tangent bundle $\bigwedge^{r} T_X$ is nef for some $1\leq r<\dim X$. We prove that, up to an étale cover, $X$ is a Fano fiber space over an Abelian variety. This gives generalizations of the structure theorem of varieties with nef tangent bundle by Demailly, Peternell and Schneider and that of varieties with nef $\bigwedge^{2} T_X$ by the author. Our result also gives an answer to a question raised by Li, Ou and Yang for varieties with strictly nef $\bigwedge^{r} T_X$ when $r < \dim X$.
We propose a conjectural list of Fano manifolds of Picard number $1$ with pseudoeffective normalized tangent bundles, which we prove in various situations by relating it to the complete divisibility conjecture of Russo and Zak on varieties with small codegree. Furthermore, the pseudoeffective thresholds and hence the pseudoeffective cones of the projectivized tangent bundles of rational homogeneous spaces of Picard number $1$ are explicitly determined by studying the total dual VMRT and the geometry of stratified Mukai flops. As a by-product, we obtain sharp vanishing theorems on the global tw…
We give simple geometric proofs of Aprodu-Farkas-Papadima-Raicu-Weyman's theorem on syzygies of tangent developable surfaces of rational normal curves and Raicu-Sam's result on syzygies of K3 carpets. As a consequence, we obtain a quick proof of Green's conjecture for general curves of genus $g$ over an algebraically closed field $\mathbf{k}$ with $\operatorname{char}(\mathbf{k}) = 0$ or $\operatorname{char}(\mathbf{k}) \geq \lfloor (g-1)/2 \rfloor$. We also show the arithmetic normality of tangent developable surfaces of arbitrary smooth projective curves of large degree.
We consider tangent cones to Schubert subvarieties of the flag variety $G/B$, where $B$ is a Borel subgroup of a reductive complex algebraic group $G$ of type $E_6$, $E_7$ or $E_8$. We prove that if $w_1$ and $w_2$ form a good pair of involutions in the Weyl group $W$ of $G$ then the tangent cones $C_{w_1}$ and $C_{w_2}$ to the corresponding Schubert subvarieties of $G/B$ do not coincide as subschemes of the tangent space to $G/B$ at the neutral point.
We prove that a holomorphic line bundle on a projective manifold is pseudo-effective if and only if its degree on any member of a covering family of curves is non-negative. This is a consequence of a duality statement between the cone of pseudo-effective divisors and the cone of ``movable curves'', which is obtained from a general theory of movable intersections and approximate Zariski decomposition for closed positive (1,1)-currents. As a corollary, a projective manifold has a pseudo-effective canonical bundle if and only if it is is not uniruled. We also prove that a 4-fold with a canonical …
The Kawaguchi--Silverman conjecture predicts that if $f\colon X \dashrightarrow X$ is a dominant rational-self map of a projective variety over $\overline{\mathbb{Q}}$, and $P$ is a $\overline{\mathbb{Q}}$-point of $X$ with Zariski-dense orbit, then the dynamical and arithmetic degrees of $f$ coincide: $λ_1(f) = α_f(P)$. We prove this conjecture in several higher-dimensional settings, including all endomorphisms of non-uniruled smooth projective threefolds with degree larger than $1$, and all endomorphisms of hyper-Kähler varieties in any dimension. In the latter case, we construct a canonical…