Examples of degenerations of Castelnuovo surfaces (Q1176084)

The authors construct some semi-stable degenerations such that a general fiber is a Castelnuovo surface, that is, a minimal algebraic surface of general type with \(c^ 2_ 1=3p_ g-7\) whose canonical map is birational onto its image. To construct some of such degenerations the authors extend Horikawa's canonical resolution of singularities on double coverings of surfaces to the case of cyclic triple coverings. --- Related results were previously obtained by Friedman and Usui.