Curves covered by the Hermitian curve

A family of maximal curves is investigated that are all quotients of the Hermitian curve. These curves provide examples of curves with the same genus, the same automorphism group and the same Weierstrass semigroup at a generic point, but that are not isomorphic.     

A maximal curve which is not a Galois subcover of the Hermitian curve

We present a maximal curve of genus 24 defined over with q = 27, that is not a Galois subcover of the Hermitian curve. *The author was partially supported by CNPq-Brazil (470193/03-4) and by PRONEX (CNPq-FAPERJ).     

On the intersection of Hermitian curves and of Hermitian surfaces

Kestenband [Unital intersections in finite projective planes, Geom. Dedicata 11(1) (1981) 107–117; Degenerate unital intersections in finite projective planes, Geom. Dedicata 13(1) (1982) 101–106] determines the structure of the intersection of two Hermitian curves of PG(2,q²), degenerate or not. In this paper we give a new proof of Kestenband's results. Giuzzi [Hermitian varieties over finite field, Ph.D. Thesis, University of Sussex, 2001] determines the structure of the intersection of two non-degenerate Hermitian surfaces and of PG(3,q²) when the Hermitian pencil defined by and contains at least one degenerate Hermitian surface. We give a new proof of Giuzzi's results and we obtain some new results in the open case when all the Hermitian surfaces of the Hermitian pencil are non-degenerate.     

On maximal curves which are not Galois subcovers of the Hermitian curve

We show that the generalized Giulietti-Korchmáros curve defined over $\mathbb{F}_{q^{2n} }$ , for n ?? 3 odd and q ?? 3, is not a Galois subcover of the Hermitian curve over $\mathbb{F}_{q^{2n} }$ . This answers a question raised by Garcia, Güneri and Stichtenoth.     

LDPC codes from the Hermitian curve

In this paper, we study the code which has as parity check matrix the incidence matrix of the design of the Hermitian curve and its (q + 1)-secants. This code is known to have good performance with an iterative decoding algorithm, as shown by Johnson and Weller in (Proceedings at the ICEE Globe com conference, Sanfrancisco, CA, 2003). We shall prove that has a double cyclic structure and that by shortening in a suitable way it is possible to obtain new codes which have higher code-rate. We shall also present a simple way to constructing the matrix via a geometric approach.      

Hermitian Morita Theory and Unitary Groups of Modules over Semisimple Artinian Rings

This article investigates isomorphisms between certain subgroups of the projective unitary groups of hermitian modules over semisimple Artinian rings with anti-structures. These subgroups contain the commutator subgroups of the projective unitary groups. Specifically, the article provides conditions under which these isomorphisms are induced by and the underlying rings are connected by hermitian Morita equivalences (HMEs). This article introduces the hyperbolic length of a module as well as the concept of generalized hyperbolic modules over simple Artinian rings, and over semisimple Artinian rings with anti-structures. The article shows that the stated isomorphisms are induced by HMEs if all the following conditions hold: (a) the hermitian forms are nonsingular and trace valued; (b) the modules in question are generalized hyperbolic; (c) the hyperbolic length equals three or is greater than or equal to five (hyperbolic length is greater than or equal to five in the semisimple case). Significantly, the condition of the hyperbolic length of a module greater than or equal to m is satisfied by a set of modules larger than or equal to those satisfying the condition of the Witt index of the module greater than or equal to m.     

Zeta functions of trinomial curves and maximal curves

We determine the zeta functions of trinomial curves in terms of Jacobi sums, and obtain an explicit formula of the genus of a trinomial curve over a finite field, and we study the conditions for this curve to be a maximal curve over a finite field.     

Pure Weierstrass gaps from a quotient of the Hermitian curve

In this paper, by employing some results on Kummer extensions, we give an arithmetic characterization of pure Weierstrass gaps at many totally ramified places on a quotient of the Hermitian curve, including the well-studied Hermitian curve as a special case. The cardinality of these pure gaps is explicitly investigated. In particular, the numbers of gaps and pure gaps at a pair of distinct places are determined precisely, which can be regarded as an extension of the previous work by Matthews (2001) considered Hermitian curves. Additionally, some concrete examples are provided to illustrate our results.     

Complete arcs arising from a generalization of the Hermitian curve (extended abstract)

We investigate arcs, in projective planes over finite fields, arising from the set of rational points of a generalization of the Hermitian curve. The degree of the arcs is closely related to the number of rational points of a class of Artin-Schreier curves.     

On nested code pairs from the Hermitian curve

Nested code pairs play a crucial role in the construction of ramp secret sharing schemes [15] and in the CSS construction of quantum codes [14]. The important parameters are (1) the codimension, (2) the relative minimum distance of the codes, and (3) the relative minimum distance of the dual set of codes. Given values for two of them, one aims at finding a set of nested codes having parameters with these values and with the remaining parameter being as large as possible. In this work we study nested codes from the Hermitian curve. For not too small codimension, we present improved constructions and provide closed formula estimates on their performance. For small codimension we show how to choose pairs of one-point algebraic geometric codes in such a way that one of the relative minimum distances is larger than the corresponding non-relative minimum distance.     

Linear series on a curve of compact type bridged by a chain of elliptic curves

In the present paper we investigate conditions for the non-existence of a smoothable limit linear series on a curve of compact type such that two smooth curves are bridged by a chain of two elliptic curves. Combining this work with results on the existence of a smoothable limit linear series on such a curve, we show relations among Brill–Noether loci of codimension at most two in the moduli space of complex curves. Specifically, Brill–Noether loci of codimension two have mutually distinct supports.