Resolution of singularities of Schubert cycles (Q1313802)

The aim of the article is to give resolution of the singularities of a Schubert cycle in the Grassmannian \(G(r,n)\) by blowing-up certain sub- Schubert cycles. Let \(K\) a field, \(r\) and \(n\) positive integers with \(r<n\), and \(G(r,n)\) the Grassmannian of \(r\)-dimensional subspaces of \(K^ n\). We call \(T\) the set of \(r\)-uples \((t) = (t_ 1, \dots, t_ r)\) of integers satisfying \(1 \leq t_ 1 < \cdots < t_ r \leq n\), and for each \((t)\) in \(T\) we introduce \(r(n - r)\) variables \(X^{(t)}_{i,j}\), \(1 \leq i \leq r\), \(1 \leq j \leq n\) and \(j \neq t_ 1, \dots, t_ r\), and we define an affine scheme \(U^{(t)} = \text{Spec} K[X^{(t)}_{i,j}]\). The scheme structure on the Grassmannian \(G(r,n)\) is obtained by gluing the affine sets \(U^{(t)}\). For any \((l)\) in \(T\), we define the Schubert cycle \(S_{(l)}\). For any \((t)\) and \((l)\) in \(T\), we define a closed subscheme \(S^{(t)}_{(l)}\) of \(U^{(t)}\) whose equations are the \((r - i + 1)\) minors of some matrix. The structure scheme on the Schubert cycle \(S_{(l)}\) is obtained by gluing the sets \(S^{(t)}_{(l)}\). The scheme \(S_{(l)}\) is not necessarily smooth and its dimension is equal to \(\sum^ r_{i = 1} (l_ i - i)\). We want to study the blowing-up of a Schubert cycle \(S_{(l)}\) in \(G(r,n)\), more precisely if we order the sub-Schubert cycles \(\sigma_ 1 \leq \cdots \leq \sigma_ k\) of \(S_{(l)}\) by dimension, we want to determine their strict transforms by this blowing-up. We put an order on \(T\) (inverse lexicographic): \((k) > (l)\) if and only if there exists \(s \geq 0\) so that \(k_ i = l_ i\) for \(i \leq s\) and \(k_{s + 1} < l_{s + 1}\). Proposition: For any \((l)\) in \(T\), \(S^{(l)}_{(l)}\) is the first nontrivial Schubert cycle in \(S^{(l)}\), i.e. \(S^{(l)}_{(l)} \neq \emptyset\) and \(S^{(l)}_{(t)} = \emptyset\) for \((t) < (l)\). Blowing-up \(S_{(l)}\), the strict transforms of the Schubert cycles in \(U^{(l)} = \text{Spec} K [X_{i,j}^{(l)}]\) are isomorphic to the Schubert cycles in \(U^{(l')}\), where \((l) > (l')\). More precisely, we can cover the blowing-up \(\widetilde {U^{(l)}}\) of \(U^{(l)}\) by affine chart \(B_{(l)} (s,t)\), with \(1 \leq s \leq r\), \(t \geq l_ s + 1\) and \(t \neq l_ 1, \dots, l_ r\). For any \((s,t)\), we can construct \((l')\) such that \((l) > (l')\) and the chart \(B_{(l)} (s,t)\) is isomorphic to \(U^{(l')}\), then the strict transform of a Schubert cycle in this chart is isomorphic to the Schubert cycle in \(U^{(l')}\). -- From the proposition, the author deduces the principal result: Corollary: Let \(\sigma\) be a Schubert cycle in \(G(r,n)\), let \(\{\sigma_ i\}\) be the Schubert cycles contained in \(\sigma\) ordered so that \(\dim \sigma_ i \leq \dim \sigma_{i + 1}\). Then \(\sigma\) can be desingularized by blowing up \(\sigma_ 1\), then by blowing up the strict transform of \(\sigma_ 2\), and so on.