Jacobians with a vanishing theta-null in genus 4

We study the codimension two locus H in A_g consisting of principally polarized abelian varieties whose theta divisor has a singularity that is not an ordinary double point. We compute the class of H in A_g for every g. For g=4, this turns out to be the locus of Jacobians with a vanishing theta-null. For g=5, via the Prym map we show that H in A_5 has two components, both unirational, which we completely describe. This gives a geometric classification of 5-dimensional ppav wh...

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 assumption on the polarization, we show that a very general polarized hyperk\"ahler fourfold $F$ of $K3^{[2]}$-type is not of Jacobian type. As a potential application, we conjecture that if a cubic fourfold is rational then its variety of li...

We construct families of principally polarized abelian varieties whose theta divisor is irreducible and contains an abelian subvariety. These families are used to construct examples when the Gauss map of the theta divisor is only generically finite and not finite. That is, the Gauss map in these cases has at least one positive-dimensional fiber. We also obtain lower-bounds on the dimension of Andreotti-Mayer loci.

The degree of a curve $C$ in a polarized abelian variety $(X,\lambda)$ is the integer $d=C\cdot\lambda$. When $C$ generates $X$, we find a lower bound on $d$ which depends on $n$ and the degree of the polarization $\lambda$. The smallest possible degree is $d=n$ and is obtained only for a smooth curve in its Jacobian with its principal polarization (Ran, Collino). The cases $d=n+1$ and $d=n+2$ are studied. Moreover, when $X$ is simple, it is shown, using results of Smyth on t...

We prove that the cotangent bundle of a complete intersection of two general translates of the theta divisor of the jacobian of a general curve of genus 4 is ample. From this the same result for a general principally polarized abelian variety of dimension 4 follows.

The paper investigates the locus of non-simple principally polarised abelian $g$-folds. We show that the irreducible components of this locus are $\Is^g_{D}$, defined as the locus of principally polarised $g$-folds having an abelian subvariety with induced polarisation of type $D=(d_1,\ldots,d_k)$, where $k\leq\frac{g}{2}$. The main theorem produces Humbert-like equations for irreducible components of $\Is^g_{D}$ for any $g$ and $D$. Moreover, there are theorems which charact...

We associate to a unimodular lattice L, endowed with an automorphism of square -1, a principally polarized abelian variety A:= L_R/L. We show that the configuration of i-invariant theta divisors of A follows a pattern very similar to the classical theory of theta characteristics; as a consequence we find that A has a high number of vanishing thetanulls. When L = E_8 we recover the 10 vanishing thetanulls of the abelian fourfold discovered by R. Varley.

We give equations for 13 genus-2 curves over $\overline{\mathbb{Q}}$, with models over $\mathbb{Q}$, whose unpolarized Jacobians are isomorphic to the square of an elliptic curve with complex multiplication by a maximal order. If the Generalized Riemann Hypothesis is true, there are no further examples of such curves. More generally, we prove under the Generalized Riemann Hypothesis that there exist exactly 46 genus-2 curves over $\overline{\mathbb{Q}}$ with field of moduli $...

We prove that for any two integers $g\geq 4$ and $g'\leq 2g-1$, there exist abelian varieties over $\overline{\mathbb{Q}}$ which are not quotients of a Jacobian of dimension $g'$. Our method in fact proves that most Abelian varieties satisfy this property, when counting by height relative to a fixed finite map to projective space.

We prove a lower bound for the codimension of the Andreotti-Mayer locus N_{g,1} and show that the lower bound is reached only for the hyperelliptic locus in genus 4 and the Jacobian locus in genus 5. In relation with the boundary of the Andreotti-Mayer loci we study subvarieties of principally polarized abelian varieties (B,Theta) parametrizing points b such that Theta and the translate Theta_b are tangentially degenerate along a variety of a given dimension.