Saturation of Jacobian ideals: some applications to nearly free curves, line arrangements and rational cuspidal plane curves (Q2318341)

The study of free curves in the projective plane has a rather long tradition, see [\textit{A. Simis}, Lect. Notes Pure Appl. Math. 244, 211--226 (2006; Zbl 1099.13030)] and [\textit{A. Simis}, Proc. Am. Math. Soc. 134, No. 6, 1591--1598 (2006; Zbl 1098.13011)]; the present paper deals with the related notion of nearly free curves, introduced by the authors in [Math. Proc. Camb. Philos. Soc. 163, No. 1, 161--172 (2017; Zbl 1387.14080); Publ. Res. Inst. Math. Sci. 54, No. 1, 163--179 (2018; Zbl 1391.14057)]. Let \(S = \mathbb{C}[x, y, z]\) be the polynomial ring in three variables with complex coefficients and let \(C : f = 0\) be a reduced curve of degree \(d\) in the complex projective plane \(\mathbb{P}^2\). The minimal degree of a Jacobian relation for \(f\) is the integer \(\mathrm{mdr}(f )\) defined as the smallest \(m \geq 0\) such that there is a non-trivial relation \(af_x + bf_y + cf_z = 0\), where \( f_x , f_y , f_z\) are the partial derivatives and \(a, b, c\) are in the vector space of homogeneous polynomials of degree \(m\). As the case \(\mathrm{mdr}(f)=0\) occurs only when \(C\) is a union of lines passing through one point, the authors assume, in this note, \(\mathrm{mdr}(f)\geq1\). Let \(J_f\) be the Jacobian ideal spanned by \(f_x,f_y,f_z\) and let \(M(f)=S/J_f\) be the Milnor algebra of \(f\). Denote by \(I_f\) the saturation of \(J_f\) with respect to the maximal ideal \({\mathfrak{m}} = (x, y, z)\) and by \(N(f )\) the Jacobian module of \(f \), namely the graded S-module \( I_f/J_f =H^o_{\mathfrak{m}}(M(f))\). \(C\) is called nearly free if \(\max_j\{\dim N(f)_j\}=1\). The paper describes the minimal free resolution of the saturated ideal \(I_f \), for a nearly free plane curve \(C : f = 0\) and shows some applications to rational cuspidal plane curves and to line arrangements. General results by \textit{S. H. Hassanzadeh} and \textit{A. Simis} [J. Algebra 371, 620--652 (2012; Zbl 1275.13019)], on the saturation of codimension 2 ideals are also discussed in the case of the ideal \(J_f\).