Search for: All records

Abstract The Brill–Noether theory of curves plays a fundamental role in the theory of curves and their moduli and has been intensively studied since the 19th century. In contrast, Brill–Noether theory for higher dimensional varieties is less understood. It is hard to determine when Brill–Noether loci are nonempty and these loci can be reducible and of larger than the expected dimension. Let $$E$$ be a semistable sheaf on $${\mathbb{P}}^{2}$$. In this paper, we give an upper bound $$\beta _{r, \mu }$$ for $$h^{0}(E)$$ in terms of the rank $$r$$ and the slope $$\mu $$ of $$E$$. We show that the bound is achieved precisely when $$E$$ is a twist of a Steiner bundle. We classify the sheaves $$E$$ such that $$h^{0}(E)$$ is within $$\lfloor \mu (E) \rfloor + 1$$ of $$\beta _{r, \mu }$$. We determine the nonemptiness, irreducibility and dimension of the Brill–Noether loci in the moduli spaces of sheaves on $${\mathbb{P}}^{2}$$ with $$h^{0}(E)$$ in this range. When they are proper subvarieties, these Brill–Noether loci are irreducible though almost always of larger than the expected dimension. 

In this paper, we show that the cohomology of a general stable bundle on a Hirzebruch surface is determined by the Euler characteristic provided that the first Chern class satisfies necessary intersection conditions. More generally, we compute the Betti numbers of a general stable bundle. We also show that a general stable bundle on a Hirzebruch surface has a special resolution generalizing the Gaeta resolution on the projective plane. As a consequence of these results, we classify Chern characters such that the general stable bundle is globally generated.