On the degree of algebraic cycles on hypersurfaces

Abstract

Let $X\subset\mathbb P^4$ be a very general hypersurface of degree $d\ge6$. Griffiths and Harris conjectured in 1985 that the degree of every curve $C\subset X$ is divisible by $d$. Despite substantial progress by Koll\'ar in 1991, this conjecture is not known for a single value of $d$. Building on Koll\'ar's method, we prove this conjecture for infinitely many $d$, the smallest one being $d=5005$. The set of these degrees $d$ has positive density. We also prove a higher-dimensional analogue of this result and construct smooth hypersurfaces defined over $\mathbb Q$ that satisfy the conjecture.