Elliptic surfaces and contact conics for a 3-nodal quartic (Q1709230)

Let \(Q\) be a reduced, nodal, quartic plane curve (over \(\mathbb C\)). A smooth conic \(C\) is a \textit{contact conic} if it is tangent to \(Q\) at \(4\) smooth distinct points. The union of \(Q\) with a contact conic \(C\) is a special type of arrangement of rational curves, whose invariants are studied by the authors. The \textit{type} \((a,b)\) of a contact conic \(C\) to \(Q\) is defined as the type of the pull-back of \(Q\) in the quadric \(\mathbb P^1\times \mathbb P^1\) which represents the double cover of the plane branched at \(C\). The authors determine the number and the types of contact conics passing through a smooth point \(z_0\) of \(Q\). They prove that if the tangent line \(t\) to \(Q\) at \(z_0\) meets \(Q\) transversally at (at least) one more point, then there are \(3\) contact conics of type \((2,2)\) and one contact conic of type \((1,3)\) through \(z_0\). If \(t\) is a bitangent, then there is only one contact conic through \(z_0\), and it has type \((1,3)\). If \(t\) passes through a node of \(Q\), then there are two contact conics through \(z_0\), both of type \((2,2)\). The result is achieved by using the construction of an elliptic surface associated to \(Q\) and \(z_0\): the desingularization of the double cover of \(\mathbb P^2\) branched at \(Q\) has a pencil of elliptic curves, pull-back of the lines through \(z_0\). The elliptic surface is obtained by resolving the base points of the pencil.