A remark on the motive of the Fano variety of lines of a cubic

Abstract

Let $X$ be a smooth cubic hypersurface, and let $F$ be the Fano variety of lines on $X$. We establish a relation between the Chow motives of $X$ and $F$. This relation implies in particular that if $X$ has finite-dimensional motive (in the sense of Kimura), then $F$ also has finite-dimensional motive. This proves finite-dimensionality for motives of Fano varieties of cubics of dimension $3$ and $5$, and of certain cubics in other dimensions.