Let $G$ be an adjoint simple algebraic group of inner type. We express the Chow motive (with integral coefficients) of an anisotropic projective $G$-homogeneous variety in terms of motives of simpler $G$-homogeneous varieties, namely, those that correspond to maximal parabolic subgroups of $G$. We decompose the motive of a generalized Severi–Brauer variety $\mathrm{SB}_2(A)$ of a division algebra $A$ of degree 5 into a direct sum of twisted motives of the Severi–Brauer variety $\mathrm{SB}(B)$ of a division algebra $B$ Brauer-equivalent to the tensor square $A^{\otimes 2}$. As an application we provide another counter-example to the uniqueness of a direct sum decomposition in the category of motives with integral coefficients.

We study the product of a Fermat hypersurface $X_0^{p+1}+\dots+X_n^{p+1}=0 \subset \mathbf{P}^n$ with $n \ge 3$ and $\mathbf{P}^1$, embedded in $\mathbf{P}^{2n+1}$ by Segre embedding where $p>0$ is the characteristic of the base field. This smooth variety is nonreflexive and has Gauss map which is an embedding. This gives a negative answer to the following Kleiman–Piene question in any positive characteristic: does the separability of the Gauss map imply reflexivity? The only known smooth examples, which give a negative answer, are given by Kaji in characteristic 2.

Our main result says that the generic rank of the Baum–Bott map for foliations of degree $d,\ d\ge 2$, of the projective plane is $d^2+d$. This answers a question of Gómez-Mont and Luengo and shows that are no other universal relations between the Baum–Bott indexes of a foliation of $\mathbb P^2$ besides the Baum–Bott formula. We also define the Camacho–Sad field for foliations on surfaces and prove its invariance under the pull-back by meromorphic maps. As an application we prove that a generic foliation of degree $d\ge 2$ is not the pull-back of a foliation of smaller degree. In Appendix A we show that the monodromy of the singular set of the universal foliation with very ample cotangent bundle is the full symmetric group.

We associate a Taylor tower supplied by the calculus of the embedding functor to the space of long knots and study its cohomology spectral sequence. The combinatorics of the spectral sequence along the line of total degree zero leads to chord diagrams with relations as in finite type knot theory. We show that the spectral sequence collapses along this line and that the Taylor tower represents a universal finite type knot invariant.

In this article, we prove that a free divisor in a three-dimensional complex manifold must be Euler homogeneous in a strong sense if the cohomology of its complement is the hypercohomology of its logarithmic differential forms. Calderón-Moreno et al. conjectured this implication in all dimensions and proved it in dimension two. We prove a theorem that describes in all dimensions a special minimal system of generators for the module of formal logarithmic vector fields. This formal structure theorem is closely related to the formal decomposition of a vector field by Kyoji Saito and is used in the proof of the above result. Another consequence of the formal structure theorem is that the truncated Lie algebras of logarithmic vector fields up to dimension three are solvable. We give an example that this may fail in higher dimensions.

We show that a linear subspace of a reductive Lie algebra $\operatorname{\mathfrak g}$ that consists of nilpotent elements has dimension at most $\frac{1}{2}(\dim\operatorname{\mathfrak g}-\operatorname{rk}\operatorname{\mathfrak g})$, and that any nilpotent subspace attaining this upper bound is equal to the nilradical of a Borel subalgebra of $\operatorname{\mathfrak g}$. This generalizes a classical theorem of Gerstenhaber, which states this fact for the algebra of $(n\times n)$-matrices.

We introduce the notion of the Bernstein–Sato polynomial of an arbitrary variety (which is not necessarily reduced nor irreducible) using the theory of V-filtrations of M. Kashiwara and B. Malgrange. We prove that the decreasing filtration by multiplier ideals coincides essentially with the restriction of the V-filtration. This implies a relation between the roots of the Bernstein–Sato polynomial and the jumping coefficients of the multiplier ideals, and also a criterion for rational singularities in terms of the maximal root of the polynomial in the case of a reduced complete intersection. These are generalizations of the hypersurface case. We can calculate the polynomials explicitly in the case of monomial ideals.

Lie algebroids cannot always be integrated into Lie groupoids. We introduce a new structure, ‘Weinstein groupoid’, which may be viewed as stacky groupoids. We use this structure to present a solution to the integration problem of Lie algebroids. It turns out that every Weinstein groupoid has a Lie algebroid and every Lie algebroid can be integrated into such a groupoid.

We show that holomorphic singular codimension one foliations of the complex projective space with a Kupka singular set of radial type and verifying some global hypotheses have rational first integral. The generic elements of such pencils are Calabi–Yau.

We compute the algebras of self-extensions of the vacuum module and the Verma modules over an affine Kac–Moody algebra $\hat{\mathfrak g}$ in suitable categories of Harish-Chandra modules. We show that at the critical level these algebras are isomorphic to the algebras of differential forms on various spaces of opers associated to the Langlands dual Lie algebra of ${\mathfrak g}$, whereas away from the critical level they become trivial. These results rely on and generalize the description of the corresponding algebras of endomorphisms obtained by Feigin and Frenkel and the description of the corresponding graded versions due to Fishel, Grojnowski and Teleman.

We study the infinite-dimensional group of holomorphic diffeomorphisms of certain Stein homogeneous spaces. We show that holomorphic automorphisms can be approximated by generalized shears arising from unipotent subgroups. For the homogeneous spaces this implies the existence of Fatou–Bieberbach domains of the first and second kind, and the failure of the Abhyankar–Moh theorem for holomorphic embeddings.

We construct bases for the stable branching algebras for the symmetric pairs $(\mathrm{GL}_{2n},\mathrm{Sp}_{2n}),\ (\mathrm{Sp}_{2(n+m)}, \mathrm{Sp}_{2n}\times\mathrm{Sp}_{2m})$ and $(\mathrm{O}_{2n},\mathrm{GL}_{n})$. Each basis element is expressed as a sum of products of pfaffians.

We show that complete conformally flat manifolds of dimension $n\geq 3$ with nonnegative Ricci curvature enjoy nice rigidity properties: they are either flat, or locally isometric to a product of a sphere and a line; or are globally conformally equivalent to ${\mathbb R}^n$ or to a spherical spaceform ${\mathbb S}^n/\Gamma$. This extends previous results due to Cheng, Noronha, Chen, Zhu and Zhu.

Let $M$ be an $n$-dimensional complete connected Riemannian manifold with sectional curvature $\operatorname{sec}(M) \geq 1$ and radius $\operatorname{rad}(M)>\pi /2$. In this article, we show that if $\operatorname{conj}(M)$, the conjugate radius of $M$, is not less than $\operatorname{rad}(M)$, then $M$ is isometric to a round sphere of constant curvature.

If G is a (split) Kac–Moody group over a field K endowed with a real valuation $\omega$, we build an action of G on a geometric object $\mathcal I$. This object is called a building, as it is an union of apartments, with the classical properties of systems of apartments. However, these apartments are more exotic: that associated to a torus T may be seen as the gluing of all Satake compactifications of affine apartments of T with respect to spherical parabolic subgroups of G containing T. Another geometric realization of these apartments makes them look more like the apartments of $\Lambda$-buildings; then the translations of the Weyl group act only on infinitely small elements of the apartment, so we call these buildings microaffine.

The colored Jones polynomial is a function $J_K:{\mathbb{N}}\longrightarrow{\mathbb{Z}}[t,t^{-1}]$ associated with a knot $K$ in 3-space. We will show that for an alternating knot $K$ the absolute values of the first and the last three leading coefficients of $J_K(n)$ are independent of $n$ when $n$ is sufficiently large. Computation of sample knots indicates that this should be true for any fixed leading coefficient of the colored Jones polynomial for alternating knots. As a corollary we get a volume-ish theorem for the colored Jones polynomial.

Let d be the degree of an algebraic one-dimensional foliation $\mathcal F$ on the complex projective space ${\mathbb P}_n$ (i.e. the degree of the variety of tangencies of the foliation with a generic hyperplane). Let $\Gamma$ be an algebraic solution of degree $\delta$, and geometrical genus g. We prove, in particular, the inequality $(d-1)\delta+2-2g\geq {\mathcal B}(\Gamma)$, where ${\mathcal B}(\Gamma)$ denotes the total number of locally irreducible branches through singular points of $\Gamma$ when $\Gamma$ has singularities, and ${\mathcal B}(\Gamma)=1$ (instead of 0) when $\Gamma$ is smooth. Equivalently, when $\Gamma=\bigcap_{\lambda=1}^{n-1} S_\lambda$ is the complete intersection of n - 1 algebraic hypersurfaces $S_\lambda$, we get $(d+n-\sum_{\lambda=1}^{n-1}\delta_\lambda)\delta \geq {\mathcal B}(\Gamma)-{\mathcal E}(\Gamma)$, where $\delta_\lambda$ denotes the degree of $S_\lambda$ and ${\mathcal E}(\Gamma)=2-2g+(\sum_\lambda\delta_\lambda-(n+1))\delta$ the correction term in the genus formula. These results are also refined when $\Gamma$ is reducible.

Quasipositive knots are transverse intersections of complex plane curves with the standard sphere $S^3 \subset {\mathbb C}^2$. It is known that any Alexander polynomial of a knot can be realized by a quasipositive knot. As a consequence, the Alexander polynomial cannot detect quasipositivity. In this paper we prove a similar result about Vassiliev invariants: for any oriented knot $K$ and any natural number $n$ there exists a quasipositive knot $Q$ whose Vassiliev invariants of order less than or equal to $n$ coincide with those of $K$.