Related papers: A new proof of the nonrationality of cubic threefo…
An arithmetic method of proving the irrationality of smooth projective 3-folds is described, using reduction modulo $p$. It is illustrated by an application to a cubic threefold, for which the hypothesis that its intermediate Jacobian is…
It is proved that the non-rationality of a generic cubic fourfold follows from a conjecture on the non-decomposability in the direct sum of non-trivial polarized Hodge structures of the polarized Hodge structure on transcendental cycles on…
We prove that the intermediate Jacobian of the Klein quartic $3$-fold $X$ is not isomorphic, as a principally polarized abelian variety, to a product of Jacobians of curves. As corollaries we deduce (using a criterion of Clemens-Griffiths)…
We show the cohomological monodromy for the universal family of smooth cubic threefolds does not factor through the genus five mapping class group. This gives a geometric group theory perspective on the well-known irrationality of cubic…
Mumford defined a natural isomorphism between the intermediate jacobian of a conic-bundle over $P^2$ and the Prym variety of a naturally defined \'etale double cover of the discrminant curve of the conic-bundle. Clemens and Griffiths used…
There are two types of involutions on a cubic threefold: the Eckardt type (which has been studied by the first named and the third named authors) and the non-Eckardt type. Here we study cubic threefolds with a non-Eckardt type involution,…
We show that there exists a $2$-dimensional family of smooth cubic threefolds admitting unirational parametrizations of coprime degrees. This together with Clemens--Griffiths' work solves the long standing open problem whether there exists…
Let $k$ be a field of characteristic zero containing a primitive fifth root of unity. Let $X/k$ be a smooth cubic threefold with an automorphism of order five, then we observe that over a finite extension of the field actually the dihedral…
We study the rationality of some geometrically rational three-dimensional conic and quadric surface bundles, defined over the reals and more general real closed fields, for which the real locus is connected and the intermediate Jacobian…
In this short note we try to generalize the Clemens-Griffiths criterion of non-rationality for smooth cubic threefolds to the case of smooth cubic fourfolds.
The intermediate Jacobian map, which associates to a smooth cubic threefold its intermediate Jacobian, does not extend to the GIT compactification of the space of cubic threefolds, not even as a map to the Satake compactification of the…
In this note we construct an example of a smooth projective threefold that is irrational over $\mathbb Q$ but is rational at all places. Our example is a complete intersection of two quadrics in $\mathbb P^5$, and we show it has the desired…
We prove that the cohomology class of any curve on a very general principally polarized abelian variety of dimension at least 4 is an even multiple of the minimal class. The same holds for the intermediate Jacobian of a very general cubic…
Following the work of Katzarkov--Kontsevich--Pantev--Yu concerning the irrationality of the very general complex cubic fourfold, we prove the following: for every rational smooth complex cubic fourfold, the primitive cohomology is…
A general linear determinantal quartic in $\mathbb{P}^4$ is nodal, non-$\mathbb{Q}$-factorial and rational. We show that the family $\mathcal{F}$ of such quartics also contains rational $\mathbb{Q}$-factorial quartics, and that a generic…
We develop a theory of Prym varieties and cubic threefolds over fields of characteristic $2$. As an application, we prove that smooth cubic threefolds are non-rational over an arbitrary field and solve a conjecture of Deligne regarding…
We study the second fundamental form of the Siegel metric in $\mathcal A_5$ restricted to the locus of intermediate Jacobians of cubic threefolds. We prove that the image of this second fundamental form, which is known to be non-trivial, is…
In this paper we define the notion of a hyperk\"ahler manifold (potentially) of Jacobian type. If we view hyperk\"ahler manifolds as "abelian varieties", then those of Jacobian type should be viewed as "Jacobian varieties". Under a minor…
In this paper we study principally polarized complex abelian varieties that admit an automorphism of order 3. It turns out that certain natural conditions on the multiplicities of its action on the differentials of the first kind do…
This paper proves the following converse to a theorem of Mumford: Let $A$ be a principally polarized abelian variety of dimension five, whose theta divisor has a unique singular point, and suppose that the multiplicity of the singular point…