Seshadri constants for vector bundles (Q2207268)

In the paper under review, the authors generalize the classical notion of the Seshadri constant. Let us present an outline of their construction. Let \(\rho : Y \rightarrow X\) be a morphism of projective schemes over an algebraically closed field and fix a closed point \(x \in X\). Let \(\pi : \mathrm{Bl}_{x}(X) \rightarrow X\) be the blow-up at \(x\) with the Cartier exceptional divisor \(E\). We can construct the commutative square with the maps \(\pi': Y' \rightarrow Y\) and \(\rho' : Y' \rightarrow\mathrm{ Bl}_{x}(X)\), where \(Y':= \mathrm{Bl}_{Y_{X}}(Y)\) and \(Y_{x} := \rho^{-1}(x)\). The exceptional divisor of \(\pi'\) is \(\rho'^{*}(E)\). Let \(\mathcal{C}_{\rho,x}\) be the set of irreducible curves in \(Y\) that meet \(Y_{X}\), but are not contained in the support of \(Y_{x}\). Let \(\mathcal{C}'_{\rho,x}\) denote their strict transform via \(\pi'\). Consider \(\xi \in N^{1}(Y)\). We say that \(\xi\) is \(\rho\)-nef if \(\xi|_{Y_{t}}\) is nef for all \(t \in X\). In many situations the authors are interested in the case when \(Y = \mathbb{P}_{X}(\nu)\) for some coherent sheaf \(\nu\) on \(X\), and in that case \(\rho : \mathbb{P}(\nu ) \rightarrow X\) is the bundle map and \(\xi = c_{1}(\mathcal{O}_{\mathbb{P}(\nu)}(1))\). We say that \(\xi\) being \(\rho\)-nef is nef at \(x\) if \(\xi \cdot C \geq 0\) for all \(C \in \mathcal{C}_{\rho, x}\). Now we are ready to define the Seshadri constant (in a relative setting) as \[\varepsilon(\xi;x) = \mathrm{inf}_{C \in \mathcal{C}_{\rho,x}} \bigg\{ \frac{\xi \cdot C}{\mathrm{mult}_{x} \rho_{*}C} \bigg\}.\] When \(Y = \mathbb{P}(\nu)\), then \(\varepsilon(\nu;x) = \varepsilon(\mathcal{O}_{\mathbb{P}(\nu)}(1);x)\). In order to provide some intuition let us notice that in the case of vector bundles \(\mathcal{V}\) on \(X\) we have, loosely speaking: \[\varepsilon(\mathcal{V};x) := \mathrm{sup} \bigg\{t \in \mathbb{R} \, : \, \pi^{*}\mathcal{V}\langle -tE \rangle \text{ is nef on curves that meet } E \text{ properly in at least one point}\}.\] Firstly, the authors observe that many classical properties of the Seshadri constants generalize to their relative version, namely: i) a Seshadri ampleness criterion holds; ii) for ample vector bundles the Seshadri constant measures asymptotic jet separation; iii) the Seshadri constants satisfy semi-continuity in both a convex geometric sense and in a variational sense; iv) for nef vector bundles \(\mathcal{V}\), the locus \(\{x \in X : \varepsilon(\mathcal{V};x) = 0\}\) coincides with the non-ample locus \(\mathbb{B}_{+}(\mathcal{V})\). Moreover, the authors provide also two nice applications. The first one provides new characterizations of projective space. Theorem. Let \(X\) be a smooth projective variety of dimension \(n\) defined over an algebraically closed field \(k\). Suppose that \(\varepsilon(TX; x_{0}) > 0\) for some closed point \(x_{0} \in X\), and suppose that one of the following conditions holds: i) \(X\) is Fano; ii) \(\mathrm{char } \,k = 0\) and \(x_{0}\) is general in a certain sense described by Kebekus; iii) \(\dim \, X = 2\). Then \(X\) is isomorphic to \(\mathbb{P}^{n}\). The second application shows that the presented version of the Seshadri constant can be used to control jet separation of the direct images of pluricanonical sheaves (see Theorem 7.1 therein).