Milnor numbers of projective hypersurfaces with isolated singularities (Q2017076)

Let \(V=V(h)\subseteq \mathbb{P}^n_{\mathbb C}\) be a hypersurface of degree \(d\) and \(\text{grad}(h):\mathbb{P}^n\dashrightarrow\mathbb{P}^n\) be the gradient map \(z\mapsto(\frac{\partial h}{\partial z_0}:\cdots :\frac{\partial h}{\partial z_n})\). Assume that \(V\) has only isolated singularities. Then \[ \deg(\text{grad}(h))=(d-1)^n-\sum\limits_{x\in V}\mu(x)\;, \] where \(\mu(x)\) is the Milnor numer of \(V\) at \(x\). It is proved that in case of \(\sum\limits_{x\in V}\mu(x)\;\) being large \(V\) cannot have a point of large multiplicity, unless \(V\) is a cone. Assume that \(V\) is not a cone with apex \(x\) and \(m\) is the multiplicity of \(V\) at \(x\). It is proved that {\parindent=6mm \begin{itemize} \item(1) \(\deg(\text{grad}(h))\geq(m-1)^{n-1}\)\ , \item (2) \(\deg (\text{grad}(h))\geq \mu^{(n-1)}\)\ . \end{itemize}} Here \(\mu^{(n-1)}\) is the \((n-1)\)--th sectional Milnor number of \(V\) at \(x\). As an application an affirmative answer to a conjecture of \textit{A. Dimca} and \textit{S. Papadima} [Ann. Math. (2) 158, No. 2, 473--507 (2003; Zbl 1068.32019)] is given.