Surface braid groups, finite Heisenberg covers and double Kodaira fibrations

Abstract

We exhibit new examples of double Kodaira fibrations by using finite Galois covers of a product $\Sigma_b \times \Sigma_b$, where $\Sigma_b$ is a smooth projective curve of genus $b \geq 2$. Each cover is obtained by providing an explicit group epimorphism from the pure braid group $\mathsf{P}_2(\Sigma_b)$ to some finite Heisenberg group. In this way, we are able to show that every curve of genus $b$ is the base of a double Kodaira fibration; moreover, the number of pairwise non-isomorphic Kodaira fibred surfaces fibering over a fixed curve $\Sigma_b$ is at least $\boldsymbol{\omega}(b+1)$, where $\boldsymbol{\omega} \colon \mathbb{N} \to \mathbb{N}$ stands for the arithmetic function counting the number of distinct prime factors of a positive integer. As a particular case of our general construction, we obtain a real $4$-manifold of signature $144$ that can be realized as a real surface bundle over a surface of genus $2$, with fibre genus $325$, in two different ways. This provides (to our knowledge) the first "double" solution to a problem from Kirby's list in low-dimensional topology.