Braid monodromy factorization for a non-prime \(K3\) surface branch curve (Q839906)

This paper considers \(K3\) surfaces of degree \(16\) in \({\mathbb P}^9\), whose hyperplane section is twice a generator of the Picard group. A degeneration of these surfaces as union of \(16\) planes (called ``pillow'' degeneration) was constructed by \textit{C. Ciliberto, R. Miranda} and \textit{M. Teicher} [Applications of algebraic geometry to coding theory, physics and computation. Proceedings of the NATO advanced research workshop, Eilat, Israel, February 25-March 1, 2001. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers. NATO Sci. Ser. II, Math. Phys. Chem. 36, 53--63 (2001; Zbl 1006.14014)]. This paper is devoted to the study of this degeneration, and of the braid monodromy factorization of the branch curve of a generic projection of one of these surfaces onto a plane. The goal of this analysis is the computation of the fundamental group of the complement of the branch curve and of the corresponding Galois cover of the surface. Although this goal is not acheived in the paper, the authors announce the result for a forthcoming paper with U. Vishne.