Some remarks on symmetric correspondences (Q2479807)

Let \(C\) be a projective nonsingular curve. A curve \(D\subset C\times C\) is said to be a \((d_1,d_2)\)-correspondence if the \(i\)th projection restricts to a morphism of degree \(d_i\) for \(i= 1,2\). A \((d,d)\)-correspondence is called symmetric if it is mapped to itself by the natural involution on \(C\times C\). In the paper the authors study a few geometrical configurations arising from a nonsingular symmetric fixed-point free \((d,d)\)-correspondence and their deformation theory. Let \(C_2\) denote the second symmetric product of \(C\) and let \(\overline D\subset C_2\) be the image of \(D\) under the canonical quotient map. Let \(T_{C_2}\langle\overline D\rangle\subset T_{C_2}\) be the inverse image of \(T_{\overline D}\subset T_{C_2|\overline D}\) under the natural restriction homomorphism \(T_{C_2}\to T_{C_2|\overline D}\). As is shown in Section 3.4.4 of the book ``Deformations of algebraic schemes'' [Grundlehren der Mathematischen Wissenschaften 334. Berlin: Springer. xi (2006; Zbl 1102.14001)] by the second author, the tangent and the obstruction space of the deformation functor of the pair \((\overline D, C_2)\) are \(H^1(C_2,T_{C_2}\langle\overline D\rangle)\) and \(H^2(C_2, T_{C_2}\langle\overline D\rangle)\), respectively. They compute these two spaces for a few examples including the classical Prym varieties.