Picard numbers of surfaces in 3-dimensional weighted projective spaces (Q5906240)

A well-known theorem of Max Noether asserts that the Picard number of a general smooth surface with \(p_ g>0\) in \({\mathbb{P}}^ 3\) is equal to 1. There are two proofs of this result, one uses the theory of Lefschetz pencils and the monodromy arguments, and another one uses the theory of variations of Hodge structures. The first proof was extended to the case of quasi-smooth surfaces in the weighted projective space \({\mathbb{P}}(1,1,a,b)\) [\textit{J. Steenbrink} in Algebraic Geometry, Proc. internat. Conf., La Rábida/Spain 1981, Lect. Notes Math. 961, 302-313 (1982; Zbl 0507.14025)]. In the present paper the second proof is extended to the case where the weights \(q_ 1,q_ 2,q_ 3\), and \(q_ 4\) are arbitrary but the degree of the surface is a multiple of \(lcm(q_ 1,q_ 2,q_ 3,q_ 4)\).