Chow groups of K3 surfaces and spherical objects

We show that for a K3 surface X the finitely generated subring R(X) of the Chow ring introduced by Beauville and Voisin is preserved under derived equivalences. This is proved by analyzing Chern characters of spherical bundles. As for a K3 surface X defined over a number field all spherical bundles on the associated complex K3 surface are defined over $\bar\QQ$, this is compatible with the Bloch-Beilinson conjecture. Besides the work of Beauville and Voisin, Lazarfeld's result on Brill-Noether theory for curves in K3 surfaces and the deformation theory developed with Macri and Stellari in arXiv:0710.1645 are central for the discussion.