The singular locus of the secant varieties of a smooth projective curve (Q1880183)

Let \(X \subset \mathbb P^N\) be a smooth irreducible complete, non-degenerated, variety over \({\mathbb C}.\) If \(S_r(X)\) denotes the \(r\)-secant variety of \(X,\) it is clear that \(S_{r-1}(X) \subset S_r(X)\) and, when \(S_r(X)\neq \mathbb P^N,\) \(S_{r-1}(X) \subset \text{Sing}(S_r(X)).\) One question is to see under which conditions \(S_{r-1}(X)= \text{Sing}(S_r(X)).\) The paper deals with this question in case \(X\) is a curve. The main result of the paper states that if \(X\) is a smooth irreducible non-degenerated curve embedded in \(\mathbb P^N\) in which there is no divisor of degree \(2r+2\) spanning a \(2r\) dimensional space, then \(S_{r-1}(X)= \text{Sing}(S_r(X)).\)