Sections, Homotopy Rational Points and Reductions of Curves

Abstract

We study unramified sections of the fundamental group sequence of smooth projective curves of genus $\geq 2$ over $p$-adic fields together with an integral model. We are particularly interested in the induced specialized sections of the special fibre and how they relate to homotopy rational points over the residue field. Under mild assumptions, such a specialized section induces a unique homotopy rational point of the special fibre that is compatible with the original section of the generic fibre in cohomological settings. We give two applications of such specialized homotopy rational points around the $\ell$-adic cycle class of a section.