Families of rationally simply connected varieties over surfaces and torsors for semisimple groups (Q691692)

Suppose \(X\) is a smooth projective variety fibered over a smooth surface \(S\), over a field of characteristic zero. Suppose furthermore that the geometric generic fibre is rationally connected. The paper deals with the question whether this implies that \(X\) has a rational point over the function field \(k(S)\) of \(S\). The answer is ``yes'' if (in addition to some technical assumptions) the geometric generic fibre admits a ``very twisting scroll''. If one applies this to the flag variety for a simple connected semisimple group \(G\) one obtains that \(G\)-torsors over \(k(S)\) are trivial, solving a conjecture of Serre in this case. The proof uses fibrations of \(S\) and that the result is already known for curves, and this can be applied to the fibres. In addition, the proof requires lots of machinery from the deformation theory of rational curves.