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Question: Is there a smooth rational variety $X$ of complex dimension $4n$, $n \in \mathbb{N}$; such that the intersection form on $H^{4n}(X,\mathbb{Z})$ is the Leech lattice?

My motivation is mainly curiosity combined with the fact that the other well-known symmetric, positive definite forms appear in this way, i.e. the well-known lattices $\Gamma_{4k}$ (of which $\Gamma_{8}$ is the famous $E_{8}$ lattice) appear as the intersection bilinear form of an complete intersection of two quadrics in $\mathbb{CP}^{4k-2}$. Due to work of Libgober and Wood (On the topological structure of even dimensional complete intersections, Trans.Amer.Math.Soc. 267 (1981) 637-660) the Leech lattice does not appear as the intersection form of any smooth complete intersection.

If such an example is not known I would also be curious to know if it is true without the rationality assumption or if there is an example containing the Leech lattice as a unimodular summand of the intersection form, etc.

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    $\begingroup$ Note that the dimension should be divisible by 4, otherwise the intersection form is not definite. $\endgroup$
    – abx
    Commented Oct 19, 2020 at 8:25
  • $\begingroup$ Thanks, edited. $\endgroup$
    – Nick L
    Commented Oct 19, 2020 at 8:31
  • $\begingroup$ do you what happens for $n=1$? $\endgroup$
    – user166192
    Commented Oct 19, 2020 at 11:20
  • $\begingroup$ No, I don't know what happens. As far as I know, there could be a smooth rational $4$-fold with this intersection form. $\endgroup$
    – Nick L
    Commented Oct 19, 2020 at 11:57

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