Ample subvarieties and rationally connected fibrations

Under some positivity assumptions, extension properties of rationally connected fibrations from a submanifold to its ambient variety are studied. Given a family of rational curves on a complex projective manifold X inducing a covering family on a submanifold Y with ample normal bundle in X, the main results relate, under suitable conditions, the associated rational connected fiber structures on X and on Y. Applications of these results include an extension theorem for Mori contractions of fiber type and a classification theorem in the case Y has a structure of projective bundle or quadric fibration. All authors acknowledge support by MIUR National Research Project “Geometry on Algebraic Varieties” (Cofin 2004). The research of the second author was partially supported by NSF grants DMS 0111298 and DMS 0548325. The third author acknowledges partial support by the University of Milan (FIRST 2003).