Use algebraic Chern classes in the Chow ring of a nonsingular algebraic variety . For a vector bundle of rank , the classes are invariant under bundle isomorphism, have , vanish for , and commute with pullback. Their Total Chern class is . The Whitney sum formula for Chern classes applies to every short exact sequence :
Normalization for a line bundle is , where is the divisor class. In particular, , , and the trivial bundle has total class one. These properties determine the classes: pull back to the iterated projective bundle where has a filtration by line bundles. The projective bundle formula for Chow groups makes this pullback injective, and Whitney multiplication expresses as the elementary symmetric polynomial of the first classes of the line factors. This also gives .
Let be the smooth degree- projective hypersurface and set . The algebraic cotangent bundle has rank . Restriction of the cotangent Euler sequence in homogeneous coordinates remains exact, because its terms and quotient are locally free. Thus
and Whitney multiplication gives
The defining equation has degree , so the conormal sheaf is . Smoothness makes its differential map injective with locally free quotient, giving the Conormal exact sequence for Kähler differentials
A second application of the Whitney sum formula for Chern classes yields
The inverse is the finite geometric series in the graded Chow ring: terms in codimension greater than vanish. Expanding gives every requested class,
For example,
when the corresponding ranks and codimensions exist. The first expression agrees with the canonical bundle of a smooth projective hypersurface . For a plane curve, , matching Q4. For a quartic surface in , and , whose degree is . These checks also confirm the sign in the cotangent, rather than tangent, formula.
Use projectivization by quotients, and set
The fibre over parametrizes one-dimensional quotients of , so it is . The standard line bundles are
Thus is the fiber class of a rational normal scroll of the ruling and is the universal quotient line bundle of . In additive divisor notation we also write for their first Chern classes. For these generate the Picard group; for , and . This fixes the sign convention for the rational normal scroll.
Put . The projective bundle formula for Chow groups gives
Here the first relation comes from the one-dimensional base, and the second is the projective-bundle relation with and higher Chern classes zero on the base. Integration over a fibre gives . Therefore all top-degree mixed intersection numbers are
In particular, for integers ,
For the canonical divisor of a smooth variety, the relative Euler sequence
has determinant . Combining its dual determinant with gives
A common twist does not change the abstract projective bundle. Choose an integer such that for every . The complete linear system of divisors has
Its map to , where , has coordinate blocks
Here is a point of the base and the are quotient coordinates in a local trivialization of . These expressions have the correct transition factors and define the global map. Any nonzero block recovers the base point through its degree- rational normal curve. Once that point is known, the blocks recover the projective fibre coordinates. On the open where the first coordinate of a nonzero block is nonzero, the ratio of the next coordinate to the first recovers ; the analogous last-coordinate chart recovers . The remaining coordinate ratios then recover the fibre coordinates regularly. Thus the map identifies with its closed image and is a projective embedding, not merely a pointwise injection.
The hyperplane class on this image is , so
Consequently every such natural embedding has
The tautological choice is an embedding when all . If the are only nonnegative, is basepoint-free but can contract the projective subbundle arising from zero summands; one must distinguish that scroll image from the smooth abstract scroll.
Let . The projective bundle formula for Chow groups is the map
Flat pullback raises dimension by , and intersection with lowers it by , so every summand has dimension .