Related papers: Cubic fourfolds of discriminant 24 and rationality
We isolate a class of smooth rational cubic fourfolds X containing a plane whose associated quadric surface bundle does not have a rational section. This is equivalent to the nontriviality of the Brauer class of the even Clifford algebra…
Some classes of cubic fourfolds are birational to fibrations over $P^2$, where the fibers are rational surfaces. This is the case for cubics containing a plane (resp. an elliptic ruled surface), where the fibers are quadric surfaces (resp.…
We exhibit new examples of rational cubic fourfolds, parametrized by a countably infinite union of codimension-two subvarieties in the moduli space. Our examples are fibered in sextic del Pezzo surfaces over the projective plane; they are…
A well known conjecture asserts that a cubic fourfold X is rational if it has a cohomologically associated K3 surface. G.Ouchi proved that if X admits a finite group G of symplectic automorphisms, whose order is different from 2, then X has…
In this paper we consider cubic 4-folds containing a plane whose discriminant curve is a reduced nodal plane sextic. In particular, we describe the singular points of such cubic 4-folds and we give an estimate of the rank of the free…
Generalizing a recent construction of Yang and Yu, we study to what extent one can intersect Hassett's Noether-Lefschetz divisors $\mathcal{C}_d$ in the moduli space of cubic fourfolds $\mathcal{C}$. In particular, we exhibit arithmetic…
We prove that the moduli space of cubic fourfolds $\mathcal{C}$ contains a divisor $\mathcal{C}_{42}$ whose general member has a unirational parametrization of degree 13. This result follows from a thorough study of the Hilbert scheme of…
There are three types of involutions on a cubic fourfold; two of anti-symplectic type, and one symplectic. Here we show that cubics with involutions exhibit the full range of behaviour in relation to rationality conjectures. Namely, we show…
Let $X\subset \P^5$ be a smooth cubic fourfold. A well known conjecture asserts that $X$ is rational if and only if there an Hodge theoretically associated K3 surface $S$. The surface $S$ can be associated to $X$ in two other different…
We study the stable rationality problem for quadric and cubic surface bundles over surfaces from the point of view of the degeneration method for the Chow group of 0-cycles. Our main result is that a very general hypersurface X of bidegree…
Are Fourier-Mukai equivalent cubic fourfolds birationally equivalent? We obtain an affirmative answer to this question for very general cubic fourfolds of discriminant 20, where we produce birational maps via the Cremona transformation…
We study points and 0-cycles on del Pezzo surfaces defined over a field K of characteristic 0, with emphasis on cubic surfaces. We prove that a cubic surface that admits a point defined over a field extension of K of degree coprime to 3…
We construct explicit examples of cubic surfaces over $\bbQ$ such that the 27 lines are acted upon by the index two subgroup of the maximal possible Galois group. This is the simple group of order $25 920$. Our examples are given in…
A special cubic fourfold is a smooth hypersurface of degree three and dimension four that contains a surface not homologous to a complete intersection. Special cubic fourfolds give rise to a countable family of Noether-Lefschetz divisors…
Recent results of Hassett, Kuznetsov and others pointed out countably many divisors $C_d$ in the open subset of $\mathbb{P}^{55}=\mathbb{P}(H^0(\mathcal{O}_{\mathbb{P}^5}(3)))$ parametrizing all cubic 4-folds and lead to the conjecture that…
We classify special self-birational transformations of the smooth quadric threefold and fourfold, $Q^3$ and $Q^4$. It turns out that there is only one such example in each dimension. In the case of $Q^3$, it is given by the linear system of…
Let X be a projective cubic hypersurface of dimension 11 or more, which is defined over the rationals. In this paper it is shown that X contains rational points provided that the cubic form defining X can be written as the sum of two forms…
It is proved that a smooth rational surface in projective four-space, which is ruled by cubics or quartics has degree at most 12. It is also proved that a smooth rational surface in projective four-space which is the image of Fn by a linear…
In this paper we explore the intersection of the Hassett divisor $\mathcal C_8$, parametrizing smooth cubic fourfolds $X$ containing a plane $P$ with other divisors $\mathcal C_i$. Notably we study the irreducible components of the…
We consider the reduction of Brauer classes on surfaces over number fields, with a view toward applications to rationality and derived equivalence. We show that a Brauer class on a very general polarized K3 surface over a number field…