Let X be a smooth complex projective variety. Using a construction devised by Gathmann, we present a recursive formula for some of the Gromov–Witten invariants of X. We prove that, when X is homogeneous, this formula gives the number of osculating rational curves at a general point of a general hypersurface of X. This generalizes the classical well known pairs of inflection (asymptotic) lines for surfaces in P^3 of Salmon, as well as Darboux’s 27 osculating conics.

We discuss the Kodaira problem for uniruled Kähler spaces. Building on a construction due to Voisin, we give an example of a uniruled Kähler space X such that every run of the K_X-MMP immediately terminates with a Mori fibre space, yet X does not admit an algebraic approximation. Our example also shows that for a Mori fibration, approximability of the base does not imply approximability of the total space.

We define tautological relations for the moduli space of stable maps to a target variety. Using the double ramification cycle formula for target varieties of Janda–Pandharipande–Pixton–Zvonkine, we construct non-trivial tautological relations parallel to Pixton’s double ramification cycle relations for the moduli of curves. Examples and applications are discussed.

We study large groups of birational transformations Bir(X), where X is a variety of dimension at least 3, defined over C or a subfield of C. Two prominent cases are when X is the projective space P^n, in which case Bir(X) is the Cremona group of rank n, or when X⊂P^{n+1} is a smooth cubic hypersurface. In both cases, and more generally when X is birational to a conic bundle, we produce infinitely many distinct group homomorphisms from Bir(X) to Z/2, showing in particular that the group Bir(X) is not perfect, and thus not simple. As a consequence, we also obtain that the Cremona group of rank n⩾3 is not generated by linear and Jonquières elements.

The main results of this paper involve general algebraic differentials ω on a general pencil of algebraic curves. We show how to determine whether ω is integrable in elementary terms for infinitely many members of the pencil. In particular, this corrects an assertion of James Davenport from 1981 and provides the first proof, even in rather strengthened form. We also indicate analogies with work of Andre and Hrushovski and with the Grothendieck–Katz Conjecture. To reach this goal, we first provide proofs of independent results which extend conclusions of relative Manin–Mumford type allied to the Zilber–Pink conjectures: we characterise torsion points lying on a general curve in a general abelian scheme of arbitrary relative dimension at least 2. In turn, we present yet another application of the latter results to a rather general pencil of Pell equations A^2−DB^2=1 over a polynomial ring. We determine whether the Pell equation (with squarefree D) is solvable for infinitely many members of the pencil.