Logarithmic Derivations of Adjoint Discriminants

Abstract

We exhibit a relationship between projective duality and the sheaf of logarithmic vector fields along a reduced divisor $D$ of projective space, in that the push-forward of the ideal sheaf of the conormal variety in the point-hyperplane incidence, twisted by the tautological ample line bundle is isomorphic to logarithmic differentials along $D$. Then we focus on the adjoint discriminant $D$ of a simple Lie group with Lie algebra $\mathfrak{g}$ over an algebraically closed field $\mathbf{k}$ of characteristic zero and study the logarithmic module $\mathrm{Der}_{\mathbf{U}}(-\log(D))$ over $\mathbf{U} = \mathbf{k}[\mathfrak{g}]$. When $\mathfrak{g}$ is simply laced, we show that this module has two direct summands: the $G$-invariant part, which is free with generators in degrees equal to the exponents of $G$, and the $G$-variant part, which is of projective dimension one, presented by the Jacobian matrix of the basic invariants of $G$ and isomorphic to the image of the map $\mathbf{ad}\,: \mathfrak{g} \otimes \mathbf{U}(-1) \rightarrow \mathfrak{g} \otimes \mathbf{U}$ given by the Lie bracket. When $\mathfrak{g}$ is not simply laced, we give a length-one equivariant graded free resolution of $\mathrm{Der}_{\mathbf{U}}(-\log(D))$ in terms of the exponents of $G$ and of the quasi-minuscule representation of $G$.