In mathematics, vanishing cycles are studied in singularity theory and other parts of algebraic geometry. They are those homology cycles of a smooth fiber in a family which vanish in the . For example, in a map from a connected complex surface to the complex projective line, a generic fiber is a smooth Riemann surface of some fixed genus g and, generically, there will be isolated points in the target whose preimages are nodal curves. If one considers an isolated critical value and a small loop around it, in each fiber, one can find a smooth loop such that the singular fiber can be obtained by pinching that loop to a point. The loop in the smooth fibers gives an element of the first homology group of a surface, and the monodromy of the critical value is defined to be the monodromy of the fi