On Oda's strong factorization conjecture (Q719171)

The strong factorization conjecture states that any birational map between smooth varieties can be factored by a sequence of blow ups of smooth centers, followed by a sequence of smooth blow downs. In this full generality almost nothing is known. The work of \textit{J. Włodarczyk} [in: Proceedings of the international congress of mathematicians (ICM). Zürich: European Mathematical Society (EMS). 653-682 (2006; Zbl 1113.14012)], suggests that the toric version of this conjecture, known as Oda conjecture, could be an important step in the direction of the general conjecture. The authors of the paper under review propose a conjectural solution to Oda's conjecture in the form of an algorithm that performs the factorization. The algorithm is explained in detail and worked out in some cases. It is still conjectural the finiteness of the algorithm.