Monodromy of the family of cubic surfaces branching over smooth cubic curves
Abstract
Consider the family of smooth cubic surfaces which can be realized as threefold-branched covers of $\mathbb{P}^{2}$, with branch locus equal to a smooth cubic curve. This family is parametrized by the space $\mathcal{U}_{3}$ of smooth cubic curves in $\mathbb{P}^{2}$ and each surface is equipped with a $\mathbb{Z}/3\mathbb{Z}$ deck group action. We compute the image of the monodromy map $\rho$ induced by the action of $\pi_{1}\left(\mathcal{U}_{3}\right)$ on the $27$ lines contained on the cubic surfaces of this family. Due to a classical result, this image is contained in the Weyl group $W\left(E_{6}\right)$. Our main result is that $\rho$ is surjective onto the centralizer of the image a of a generator of the deck group. Our proof is mainly computational, and relies on the relation between the $9$ inflection points in a cubic curve and the $27$ lines contained in the cubic surface branching over it.
- Publication:
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arXiv e-prints
- Pub Date:
- October 2019
- DOI:
- 10.48550/arXiv.1910.09593
- arXiv:
- arXiv:1910.09593
- Bibcode:
- 2019arXiv191009593M
- Keywords:
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- Mathematics - Algebraic Geometry;
- Mathematics - Algebraic Topology;
- Mathematics - Geometric Topology
- E-Print:
- Final version, to appear in Annales de l'Institut Fourier. Link to computation repository included. 17 pages, 6 figures