Kummer surfaces for the selfproduct of the cuspidal rational curve

Abstract

The classical Kummer construction attaches to an abelian surface a K3 surface. As Shioda and Katsura showed, this construction breaks down for supersingular abelian surfaces in characteristic two. Replacing supersingular abelian surfaces by the selfproduct of the rational cuspidal curve, and the sign involution by suitable infinitesimal group scheme actions, I give the correct Kummer-type construction in this situation. We encounter rational double points of type D_4 and D_8, instead of type A_1. It turns out that the resulting surfaces are supersingular K3 surfaces with Artin invariant one and two. They lie in a 1-dimensional family obtained by simultaneous resolution after purely inseparable base change.