English

Brill-Noether theory for cyclic covers

Algebraic Geometry 2018-11-16 v2

Abstract

The Brill-Noether Theorem gives necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of a linear series. Here we consider a general n-fold, etale cyclic cover p of a curve C of genus g and investigate for which numbers r,d a linear series of dimension r and degree d exists on the covering curve. For r=1 this gives gonality. Using degeneration to a special singular example (containing a Castelnuovo canonical curve) and the theory of of limit linear series for tree-like curves we show that the Pl\"ucker formula yields a necessary condition for the existence of a linear series (of dimension r, degree d) which is only slightly weaker than the sufficient condition given by the result of Kleimann and Laksov, for all n,r,d.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1603.05084,
  title  = {Brill-Noether theory for cyclic covers},
  author = {Irene Schwarz},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1603.05084},
  year   = {2018}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-22T13:12:16.234Z