On the Bielliptic and Bihyperelliptic Loci

Abstract

We study some particular loci inside the moduli space $\mathcal{M}_g$, namely the bielliptic locus (i.e. the locus of curves admitting a $2:1$ cover over an elliptic curve $E$) and the bihyperelliptic locus (i.e. the locus of curves admitting a $2:1$ cover over a hyperelliptic curve $C'$, $g(C') \geq 2$). We show that the bielliptic locus is not a totally geodesic subvariety of $\mathcal{A}_g$ if $g \geq 4$ (while it is for $g=3$, see [16]) and that the bihyperelliptic locus is not totally geodesic in $\mathcal{A}_g$ if $g \geq 3g'$. We also give a lower bound for the rank of the second gaussian map on the generic point of the bielliptic locus and an upper bound for this rank for every bielliptic curve.