An exhaustive computer search for finding new curves with many points among fibre products of two Kummer covers over $\\Bbb{F}_5$ and $\\Bbb{F}_7$

Abstract

In this paper we make an exhaustive computer search for finding new curves with many points among fibre products of 2 Kummer covers of the projective line over F5 and F7 . At the end of the search, we have 12 records and 6 new entries for the current Table of Curves with Many Points. In particular, we observe that the fibre product $y^3_1$ = $\\frac {5(x+2)(x +5)} {x}$, $y^3_2$ $\\frac {3x^2(x +5)} {x + 3}$ over F7 has genus 7 with 36 rational points. As this coincides with the Ihara bound, we conclude that the maximum number N7 (7) of F7 -rational points among all curves of genus 7 is 36. Our exhaustive search has been possible because of the methods given in the recent work by Özbudak and Temür (2012) for determining the number of rational points of such curves.