On foliations of the real projective plane defined by decomposable pencils of cubics (Q2668177)

The authors investigate pencils of cubic curves on the real projective plane \(\mathbb{R}P^2\) seen as foliations. Their main result is the following. {Theorem 1.1.} Among regular pencils of cubics in \(\mathbb{R}P^2\), exactly the following numbers of real singular curves \(n\) and real foliation singularities \(N\) occur: \[ 0 \leq n \leq 12,\quad 1 \leq N \leq 21. \] Exactly the following numbers of centers \(c\), saddles \(sa\), and stars \(st\) occur: \[ 0 \leq c \leq 6,\quad 0 \leq sa \leq 10, \quad 0 \leq st \leq 2. \] To prove this result they analyse the discriminant of the pencil, possible singular fibres, and the Poincaré-Hopf indices of the foliation singularities appearing in such pencils. Then they show that most cases are realised by decomposable pencils -- those given by \(\alpha G_1 G_2 G_3 + \beta H_1 H_2 H_3\), for \(G_i, H_i\) linear polynomials. The remaining cases are dealt with also by exhibiting explicit examples.