Arf characters of an algebroid curve

Abstract

Two algebroid branches are said to be equivalent if they have the same multiplicity sequence. It is known that two algebroid branches $R$ and $T$ are equivalent if and only if their Arf closures, $R'$ and $T'$ have the same value semigroup, which is an Arf numerical semigroup and can be expressed in terms of a finite set of information, a set of characters of the branch. We extend the above equivalence to algebroid curves with $d>1$ branches. An equivalence class is described, in this more general context, by an Arf semigroup, that is not a numerical semigroup, but is a subsemigroup of $\mathbb N^d$. We express this semigroup in terms of a finite set of information, a set of characters of the curve, and apply this result to determine other curves equivalent to a given one.