Arc valuations on smooth varieties

Let X be a nonsingular variety (with dimX⩾2) over an algebraically closed field k of characteristic zero. Let be an arc on X, and let v=ordα be the valuation given by the order of vanishing along α. We describe the maximal irreducible subset C(v) of the arc space of X such that valC(v)=v. We describe C(v) both algebraically, in terms of the sequence of valuation ideals of v, and geometrically, in terms of the sequence of infinitely near points associated to v. As a corollary, we get that v is determined by its sequence of centers. Also, when X is a surface, our construction also applies to any divisorial valuation v, and in this case C(v) coincides with the one introduced in [L. Ein, R. Lazarsfeld, M. Mustaţǎ, Contact loci in arc spaces, Compos. Math. 140 (2004) 1229–1244, Example 2.5].