In this paper, we prove that klt singularities are invariant under deformations if the generic fiber is $\mathbb {Q}$ -Gorenstein. We also obtain a similar result for slc singularities. These are generalizations of results of Esnault-Viehweg [Math. Ann. 271 (1985), 439–449] and S. Ishii [Math. Ann. 275 (1986), 139–148; Singularities (Iowa City, IA, 1986) Contemporary Mathematics, vol. 90 (American Mathematical Society, Providence, RI, 1989), 135–145].

In this paper, we study the singularities of a general hyperplane section $H$ of a three-dimensional quasi-projective variety $X$ over an algebraically closed field of characteristic $p>0$. We prove that if $X$ has only canonical singularities, then $H$ has only rational double points. We also prove, under the assumption that $p>5$, that if $X$ has only klt singularities, then so does $H$.

Let $(S,\mathfrak{m})$ be an $n$-dimensional regular local ring essentially of finite type over a field and let $\mathfrak{a}$ be an ideal of $S$. We prove that if $\text{depth}\,S/\mathfrak{a}\geqslant 3$, then the cohomological dimension $\text{cd}(S,\mathfrak{a})$ of $\mathfrak{a}$ is less than or equal to $n-3$. This settles a conjecture of Varbaro for such an $S$. We also show, under the assumption that $S$ has an algebraically closed residue field of characteristic zero, that if $\text{depth}\,S/\mathfrak{a}\geqslant 4$, then $\text{cd}(S,\mathfrak{a})\leqslant n-4$ if and only if the local Picard group of the completion $\widehat{S/\mathfrak{a}}$ is torsion. We give a number of applications, including a vanishing result on Lyubeznik’s numbers, and sharp bounds on the cohomological dimension of ideals whose quotients satisfy good depth conditions such as Serre’s conditions $(S_{i})$.

A singularity in characteristic zero is said to be of dense $F$-pure type if its modulo $p$ reduction is locally Frobenius split for infinitely many $p$. We prove that if $x\in X$ is an isolated log canonical singularity with $\mu (x\in X)\leq 2$ (where the invariant $\mu $ is as defined in Definition 1.4), then it is of dense $F$-pure type. As a corollary, we prove the equivalence of log canonicity and being of dense $F$-pure type in the case of three-dimensional isolated $ \mathbb{Q} $-Gorenstein normal singularities.

The test ideal τ(R) of a ring R of prime characteristic is an important object in the theory of tight closure. In this paper, we study a generalization of the test ideal, which is the ideal τ(at) associated to a given ideal a with rational exponent t ≥ 0. We first prove a key lemma of this paper (Lemma 2.1), which gives a characterization of the ideal τ(at). As applications of this key lemma, we generalize the preceding results on the behavior of the test ideal τ(R). Moreover, we prove an analogue of so-called Skoda’s theorem, which is formulated algebraically via adjoint ideals by Lipman in his proof of the “modified Briançon-Skoda theorem.”