Let G be a numerical semigroup. We prove an upper bound for the Betti numbers of the semigroup ring of G which depends only on the width of G, that is, the difference between the largest and the smallest generators of G. In this way, we make progress towards a conjecture of Herzog and Stamate. Moreover, for 4-generated numerical semigroups, the first significant open case, we prove the Herzog-Stamate bound for all but finitely many values of the width. This is a joint work with A. Moscariello and A. Sammartano.

We introduce a general equivalence problems for geometric structures arising from minimal rational curves on uniruled complex projective manifolds. To study these problems, we need approaches fusing differential geometry and algebraic geometry. Among such geometric structures, those associated to homogeneous manifolds are particularly accessible to differential-geometric methods of Cartan geometry. But even in these cases, only a few cases have been worked out so far. We review some recent developments.

I tell a personal story of how a mathematician working in complex algebraic geometry had come to discover the relevance of Cartan geometry, a subject in differential geometry, in an old problem in algebraic geometry, the problem of deformations of Grassmannians as projective manifolds, which originated from the work of Kodaira and Spencer. In my joint work with Ngaiming Mok, we used the theory of minimal rational curves to study such deformations and it reduced the question to a problem in Cartan geometry.