Prym varieties of cyclic coverings (Q649037)

Given a smooth projective curve of genus \(g\geq 2\) over the field of complex numbers and a cyclic covering \(f:{\widetilde C} \to C\) of degree \(n\) branched along a reduced divisor on \(C\) of degree \(r\geq 0\), being \({\widetilde C}\) a smooth projective curve of genus \(ng-n+1 +r(n-1)/2\), one can consider the Prym variety \(P(f)\) of dimension \(p=(n-1)(g-1) + r(n-1)/2\). This variety is defined as the abelian subvariety \(P(f)=\text{Im}(1-\sigma)\) of the Jacobian variety \(J{\widetilde C}\), where \(\sigma\) is the automorphism on \(J{\widetilde C}\) induced by an automorphism on \({\widetilde C}\) generating the cyclic group of the covering. The canonical principal polarization of \(J{\widetilde C}\) induces a polarization on \(P(f)\) whose type \(D\) depends only on the topological structure of the covering \(f\). The authors focus on the study of the Prym map for cyclic coverings of degree \(n\): \[ \text{Pr}_g(n,r): \mathcal{R}_g(n,r) \to \mathcal{A}_{p,D} \] where \(\mathcal{R}_g(n,r)\) is the moduli space of these cyclic coverings and \(\mathcal{A}_{p,D}\) is the moduli space of polarized abelian varieties of dimension \(p\) and polarization type \(D\). In fact, for the case \(n=2\) and \(r=0\), the properties of the Prym map have been extensively studied in the literature. Notice that in this case the Prym map associates to an étale double covering of a curve of genus \(g\) its principally polarized abelian variety of dimension \(g-1\). In this paper, the authors show that the differential of the Prym map \(\text{Pr}_g(n,r)\) at a general cyclic covering is injective in most cases. As a consequence the Prym map is generically finite in most cases and, from this, the authors conclude that the dimension of the image of the Prym map is \(3g-3+r\).