Catanese-Ciliberto surfaces of fiber genus three with unique singular fiber (Q2498049)

Minimal surfaces of general type with \(p_g=q=1\) and \(K^2=3\) have been deeply investigated by \textit{F. Catanese} and \textit{C. Ciliberto} [in: Problems in the theory of surfaces and their classification. Papers from the meeting held at the Scuola Normale Superiore, Cortona, Italy. Symp. Math. 32, 49--79 (1991; Zbl 0828.14024) and J. Algebr. Geom. 2, No. 3, 389--411 (1993; Zbl 0791.14015)], so the author refers to them as Catanese-Ciliberto surfaces. He studies Catanese-Ciliberto surfaces whose Albanese map is a fibration whose fibre is a genus \(3\) curve. By classical Zeuthen-Segre formula they have from one to nine singular fibres. The author classifies the most degenerate case: surfaces in this class having only one singular fibre. Recall that, by standard monodromy arguments, if a fibration with rational base has a singular fibre, must have at least two of them. For the Albanese fibration of a Catanese-Ciliberto surface the base has obviously genus \(1\). The family the author finds has dimension \(1\). He shows that the map associating to each such surface its Albanese image induces a degree \(4\) dominant map of this family onto the moduli space of elliptic curves, branched (with branching index \(2\)) on the locus of curves having an automorphism of complex multiplication type. Starting point is the classification of Catanese-Ciliberto surfaces whose Albanese fiber has genus \(3\), achieved by Catanese and Ciliberto in the second of the above mentioned papers, as relative quartics in the \({\mathbb P}^2\)-bundle over its Albanese image \(E\) associated to an indecomposable vector bundle of rank \(3\). Taking an isogeny of degree \(3\) \(\varphi:\tilde{E} \rightarrow E\) and pulling back the fibration one obtains a relative quartic in the \({\mathbb P}^2\)-bundle over \(\tilde{E}\) associated to the pull-back of the above mentioned (indecomposable) vector bundle, that is a direct sum of line bundles. This makes this surface easier to study since the decomposition of the bundle provides a global homogeneous coordinates system for the \({\mathbb P}^2\)-bundle, so the author can write down the equation of the surface, and do explicit computations on it. Let us also mention that a classification of Catanese-Ciliberto surfaces was completed, shortly after the publication of this paper, by \textit{F. Catanese} and the reviewer [Ann. Sci. Éc. Norm. Supér. (4) 39, No. 6, 1011--1049 (2006; Zbl 1125.14023)].