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Homaloidal determinants

A form in a polynomial ring over a field is said to be homaloidal if its polar map is a Cremona map, i.e., if the rational map defined by the partial derivatives of the form has an inverse rational map. The object of this work is the search for homaloidal polynomials that are the determinants of sufficiently structured matrices. We focus on generic catatalecticants, with special emphasis on the Hankel matrix. An additional focus is on certain degenerations or specializations thereof. In addition to studying the homaloidal nature of these determinants, one establishes several results on the ideal theoretic invariants of the respective gradient ideals, such as primary components, multiplicity, reductions and free resolutions.