Brill-Noether-type theorems with a movable ramification point

Abstract

The classical Brill-Noether theorems count the dimension of the family of maps from a general curve of genus g to non-degenerate curves of degree d in projective space Pr. These theorems can be extended to include ramification conditions at fixed general points. This thesis deals with the problem of imposing a ramification condition at an unspecified point. We solve the problem completely in dimension 1, prove a closed-form existence criterion and a finiteness result in dimension 2, and provide an existence test and bound the dimension of the family in the general case.