Determining plane curve singularities from its polars

Abstract

This paper addresses a very classical topic that goes back at least to Plücker: how to understand a plane curve singularity using its polar curves. Here, we explicitly construct the singular points of a plane curve singularity directly from the weighted cluster of base points of its polars. In particular, we determine the equisingularity class (or topological equivalence class) of a germ of plane curve from the equisingularity class of generic polars and combinatorial data about the non-singular points shared by them.

22 pages. Final version, to appear in Advances in Math