On the double EPW sextic associated to a Gushel–Mukai fourfold

Abstract

In analogy to the case of cubic fourfolds, we discuss the conditions under which the double cover $\tilde{Y}_A$ of the EPW sextic hypersurface associated to a Gushel-Mukai fourfold is birationally equivalent to a moduli space of (twisted) stable sheaves on a K3 surface. In particular, we prove that $\tilde{Y}_A$ is birational to the Hilbert scheme of two points on a K3 surface if and only if the Gushel-Mukai fourfold is Hodge-special with discriminant $d$ such that the negative Pell equation $\mathcal{P}_{d/2}(-1)$ is solvable in $\mathbb{Z}$.