Perverse coherent sheaves and the geometry of special pieces in the unipotent variety

Let X be a scheme of finite type over a Noetherian base scheme S admitting a dualizing complex, and let U be an open subset whose complement has codimension at least 2. We extend the Deligne-Bezrukavnikov theory of perverse coherent sheaves by showing that a coherent middle extension (or intersection cohomology) functor from perverse sheaves on U to perverse sheaves on X may be defined for a much broader class of perversities than has previously been known. We also introduce a derived category version of the coherent middle extension functor. Under suitable hypotheses, we introduce a construction (called "S2-extension") in terms of perverse coherent sheaves of algebras on X that takes a finite morphism to U and extends it in a canonical way to a finite morphism to X. In particular, this construction gives a canonical "S2-ification" of appropriate X. The construction also has applications to the "Macaulayfication" problem, and it is particularly well-behaved when X is Gorenstein. Our main goal, however, is to address a conjecture of Lusztig on the geometry of special pieces (certain subvarieties of the unipotent variety of a reductive algebraic group). The conjecture asserts in part that each special piece is the quotient of some variety (previously unknown in the exceptional groups and in positive characteristic) by the action of a certain finite group. We use S2-extension to give a uniform construction of the desired variety.Comment: 30 pages; minor corrections and addition

Around ℓ\ell-independence

In this article we study various forms of $\ell$-independence (including the case $\ell=p$) for the cohomology and fundamental groups of varieties over finite fields and equicharacteristic local fields. Our first result is a strong form of $\ell$-independence for the unipotent fundamental group of smooth and projective varieties over finite fields, by then proving a certain `spreading out' result we are able to deduce a much weaker form of $\ell$-independence for unipotent fundamental groups over equicharacteristic local fields, at least in the semistable case. In a similar vein, we can also use this to deduce $\ell$-independence results for the cohomology of semistable varieties from the well-known results on $\ell$-independence for smooth and proper varieties over finite fields. As another consequence of this `spreading out' result we are able to deduce the existence of a Clemens--Schmid exact sequence for formal semistable families. Finally, by deforming to characteristic $p$ we show a similar weak version of $\ell$-independence for the unipotent fundamental group of a semistable curve in mixed characteristic.Comment: 23 pages, comments welcom

On some partitions of a flag manifold

In an earlier paper by Kazhdan and the author, a map from the set of unipotent classes in a reductive connected group over C to the conjugacy classes in the Weyl group was defined. Here we present some experimental evidence for a possibly alternative definition of that map in terms of the pieces in certain partitions of the flag manifold.Comment: 9 page