On curves on Hirzebruch surfaces

Abstract

We call a smooth irreducible projective curve a Castelnuovo curve if it admits a birational map into the projective r-space such that the image curve has degree at least 2r+1 and the maximum possible geometric genus (which one can calculate by a classical formula due to Castelnuovo). It is well known that a Castelnuovo curve must lie on a Hirzebruch surface (rational ruled surface). Conversely, making use of a result of W. Castryck and F. Cools concerning the scrollar invariants of curves on Hirzebruch surfaces we show that curves on Hirzebruch surfaces are Castelnuovo curves unless their genus becomes too small w.r.t. their gonality. We analyze the situation more closely, and we calculate the number of moduli of curves of fixed genus g and fixed gonality k lying on Hirzebruch surfaces, in terms of g and k.