Analytical degeneration of complete twisted cubics

Abstract

In Schubert's book Abzählende Geometrie(3) there are listed, with no formal verifications, eleven first-order degenerations of the twisted cubic curve in S3. The curve, in this connexion, was seen by Schubert as a union C = (CL, CE, CT) of three simply infinite element systems, the locus CL of its points, the envelope CE of its osculating planes and the system CT of its tangent lines, the complete twisted cubic so envisaged being regarded as a single geometric variable of freedom 12, and any degeneration (projective specialization) of it, C¯ = (C¯L, C¯E, C¯T), being said to be of the first order if it has freedom 11. Schubert used the symbols λ, λ′, k, k′ w, w′, θ, θ′, δ, δ′, η to denote the eleven first-order degenerations in question, the dashed symbol denoting always the dual of that denoted by the undashed. In this paper we exhibit analytically the existence of the above degenerations and indicate further how degenerations of higher order can be systematically investigated. We use for this purpose the analytical theory of complete collineations which has just recently been developed (1,4), and also some of the ideas contained in van der Waerden's earlier development of his general method of degenerate collineations (5).