Special subhomaloidal systems of quadrics and varieties with one apparent double point (Q4405576)

The authors study linear systems of quadrics on projective space whose base locus is a smooth irreducible variety and look for conditions assuring that they are (completely) subhomaloidal; they also show new properties of varieties \(X_n \subset \mathbb P^{2n+1}\) defined by quadratic equations and study projections of such varieties from (subspaces of) the tangent space. In section 1, the authors introduce special subhomaloidal systems of quadrics. Special subhomaloidal systems can be found in the literature and have received considerable attention by \textit{J. G. Semple} [Proc. Lond. Math. Soc., II. Ser. 32, 200--221 (1931; Zbl 0001.15703)], \textit{J. G. Semple} and \textit{J. A. Tyrrell} [Mathematika 16, 88--97 (1969; Zbl 0176.51001)] and more recently by \textit{L. Ein} and \textit{N. Shepherd-Barron} [Am. J. Math. 111, 783--800 (1989; Zbl 0708.14009)] and \textit{K. Hulek, S. Katz} and \textit{F.-O. Schreyer} [Math. Z. 209, 419--443 (1992; Zbl 0767.14005)]. The authors also generalize the fact that quadrics defining some well known smooth varieties of small degree with respect to codimension form a (sub)homaloidal system. At the end of the first section, they furnish a first geometrical interpretation of the fact that the scheme of quadratic forms theoretically defining a variety give a completely subhomaloidal linear system. In section 2 the definition of a variety with one apparent double point is recalled. As an application of the results it is proved in theorem 1 that a smooth variety \(X_n \subset \mathbb P^{2n+1}\) with \(\text{Sec}(X) = \mathbb P^{2n+1}\) and satisfying condition \(K_2\) has one apparent double point. The classification of these varieties is known for \( n < 3 \) [see e.g. \textit{F. Russo}, Math. Ann. 316, 1--17 (2000; Zbl 0993.14019) and \textit{Severi} [Rend. Circ. Mat. Palermo 15, 33--51 (1901; JFM 32.0648.04)]. In section 3, the authors study the projection of a variety \(X_n \subset \mathbb P^{2n+1}\) from (subspaces of) the tangent space at a general point. They prove in proposition 3 that the projection from a general tangent space is a generically finite rational map if and only if \(X_n\) is not secant defective and prove in proposition 4 that a variety with one apparent double point whose entry locus is quadratic for every \( q \in \mathbb P^{2n+1}\setminus X_n \) projects birationally from the tangent space at a general point and if it is a scheme theoretic intersection of quadrics it is also arithmetically Cohen-Macaulay. In sections 4 and 5 they completely classify n-dimensional varieties with one apparent double point and of degree \(2n+4 \geq d \) (see theorem 2). For \(2n+2 < d < 2n+4 \) the authors prove in theorem 3 that there are only three varieties with one apparent double point. At the end of the section they give a classification of smooth varieties with an apparent double point which are hyperquadric fibrations over a smooth curve, stated as proposition 9. For the range \( d >2n+4 , n \geq 4\) the authors comment that the classification is isolated and sporadic.