Let p be a prime and let r, s be positive integers. In this paper, we prove that the Goormaghtigh equation $(x^m-1)/(x-1)=(y^n-1)/(y-1)$, $x,y,m,n \in {\mathbb {N}}$, $\min \{x,y\}>1$, $\min \{m,n\}>2$ with $(x,y)=(p^r,p^s+1)$ has only one solution $(x,y,m,n)=(2,5,5,3)$. This result is related to the existence of some partial difference sets in combinatorics.

Niven’s theorem asserts that $\{\cos (r\pi ) \mid r\in \mathbb {Q}\}\cap \mathbb {Q}=\{0,\pm 1,\pm 1/2\}.$ In this paper, we use elementary techniques and results from arithmetic dynamics to obtain an algorithm for classifying all values in the set $\{\cos (r\pi ) \mid r\in \mathbb {Q}\}\cap K$, where K is an arbitrary number field.

We use bounds of character sums and some combinatorial arguments to show the abundance of very smooth numbers which also have very few nonzero binary digits.

As an extension of Sylvester’s matrix, a tridiagonal matrix is investigated by determining both left and right eigenvectors. Orthogonality relations between left and right eigenvectors are derived. Two determinants of the matrices constructed by the left and right eigenvectors are evaluated in closed form.

We prove quantitative bounds for the inverse theorem for Gowers uniformity norms $\mathsf {U}^5$ and $\mathsf {U}^6$ in $\mathbb {F}_2^n$. The proof starts from an earlier partial result of Gowers and the author which reduces the inverse problem to a study of algebraic properties of certain multilinear forms. The bulk of the work in this paper is a study of the relationship between the natural actions of $\operatorname {Sym}_4$ and $\operatorname {Sym}_5$ on the space of multilinear forms and the partition rank, using an algebraic version of regularity method. Along the way, we give a positive answer to a conjecture of Tidor about approximately symmetric multilinear forms in five variables, which is known to be false in the case of four variables. Finally, we discuss the possible generalization of the argument for $\mathsf {U}^k$ norms.

A set of integers greater than 1 is primitive if no member in the set divides another. Erdős proved in 1935 that the series $f(A) = \sum _{a\in A}1/(a \log a)$ is uniformly bounded over all choices of primitive sets A. In 1986, he asked if this bound is attained for the set of prime numbers. In this article, we answer in the affirmative.

As further applications of the method, we make progress towards a question of Erdős, Sárközy and Szemerédi from 1968. We also refine the classical Davenport–Erdős theorem on infinite divisibility chains, and extend a result of Erdős, Sárközy and Szemerédi from 1966.

The tame Gras–Munnier Theorem gives a criterion for the existence of a $ {\mathbb Z}/p{\mathbb Z} $-extension of a number field K ramified at exactly a tame set S of places of K, the finite $v \in S$ necessarily having norm $1$ mod p. The criterion is the existence of a nontrivial dependence relation on the Frobenius elements of these places in a certain governing extension. We give a short new proof which extends the theorem by showing the subset of elements of $H^1(G_S,{\mathbb {Z}}/p{\mathbb {Z}})$ giving rise to such extensions of K has the same cardinality as the set of these dependence relations. We then reprove the key Proposition 2.2 using the more sophisticated Greenberg–Wiles formula based on global duality.

Sarnak’s density conjecture is an explicit bound on the multiplicities of nontempered representations in a sequence of cocompact congruence arithmetic lattices in a semisimple Lie group, which is motivated by the work of Sarnak and Xue ([58]). The goal of this work is to discuss similar hypotheses, their interrelation and their applications. We mainly focus on two properties – the spectral spherical density hypothesis and the geometric Weak injective radius property. Our results are strongest in the p-adic case, where we show that the two properties are equivalent, and both imply Sarnak’s general density hypothesis. One possible application is that either the spherical density hypothesis or the Weak injective radius property imply Sarnak’s optimal lifting property ([57]). Conjecturally, all those properties should hold in great generality. We hope that this work will motivate their proofs in new cases.

We construct an anticyclotomic Euler system for the Rankin–Selberg convolutions of two modular forms, using p-adic families of generalised Gross–Kudla–Schoen diagonal cycles. As applications of this construction, we prove new results on the Bloch–Kato conjecture in analytic ranks zero and one, and a divisibility towards an Iwasawa main conjecture.

We describe a family of compactifications of the space of Bridgeland stability conditions of a triangulated category, following earlier work by Bapat, Deopurkar and Licata. We particularly consider the case of the 2-Calabi–Yau category of the $A_2$ quiver. The compactification is the closure of an embedding (depending on q) of the stability space into an infinite-dimensional projective space. In the $A_2$ case, the three-strand braid group $B_3$ acts on this closure. We describe two distinguished braid group orbits in the boundary, points of which can be identified with certain rational functions in q. Points in one of the orbits are exactly the q-deformed rational numbers recently introduced by Morier-Genoud and Ovsienko, while the other orbit gives a new q-deformation of the rational numbers. Specialising q to a positive real number, we obtain a complete description of the boundary of the compactification.

We prove that real topological Hochschild homology $\mathrm {THR}$ for schemes with involution satisfies base change and descent for the ${\mathbb {Z}/2}$-isovariant étale topology. As an application, we provide computations for the projective line (with and without involution) and the higher-dimensional projective spaces.

We present some results related to Zilber’s Exponential-Algebraic Closedness Conjecture, showing that various systems of equations involving algebraic operations and certain analytic functions admit solutions in the complex numbers. These results are inspired by Zilber’s theorems on raising to powers.

We show that algebraic varieties which split as a product of a linear subspace of an additive group and an algebraic subvariety of a multiplicative group intersect the graph of the exponential function, provided that they satisfy Zilber’s freeness and rotundity conditions, using techniques from tropical geometry.

We then move on to prove a similar theorem, establishing that varieties which split as a product of a linear subspace and a subvariety of an abelian variety A intersect the graph of the exponential map of A (again under the analogues of the freeness and rotundity conditions). The proof uses homology and cohomology of manifolds.

Finally, we show that the graph of the modular j-function intersects varieties which satisfy freeness and broadness and split as a product of a Möbius subvariety of a power of the upper-half plane and a complex algebraic variety, using Ratner’s orbit closure theorem to study the images under j of Möbius varieties.

Abstract prepared by Francesco Paolo Gallinaro

E-mail: francesco.gallinaro@mathematik.uni-freiburg.de

URL: https://etheses.whiterose.ac.uk/31077/

Let p be a prime. In this paper, we use techniques from Iwasawa theory to study questions about rank jump of elliptic curves in cyclic extensions of degree p. We also study growth of the p-primary Selmer group and the Shafarevich–Tate group in cyclic degree-p extensions and improve upon previously known results in this direction.

We formulate a generalization of Riesz-type criteria in the setting of L-functions belonging to the Selberg class. We obtain a criterion which is sufficient for the grand Riemann hypothesis (GRH) for L-functions satisfying axioms of the Selberg class without imposing the Ramanujan hypothesis on their coefficients. We also construct a subclass of the Selberg class and prove a necessary criterion for GRH for L-functions in this subclass. Identities of Ramanujan–Hardy–Littlewood type are also established in this setting, specific cases of which yield new transformation formulas involving special values of the Meijer G-function of the type ${G^{n , 0}_{0 , n}}$.

For a finite extension F of ${\mathbf Q}_p$, Drinfeld defined a tower of coverings of (the Drinfeld half-plane). For $F = {\mathbf Q}_p$, we describe a decomposition of the p-adic geometric étale cohomology of this tower analogous to Emerton’s decomposition of completed cohomology of the tower of modular curves. A crucial ingredient is a finiteness theorem for the arithmetic étale cohomology modulo p whose proof uses Scholze’s functor, global ingredients, and a computation of nearby cycles which makes it possible to prove that this cohomology has finite presentation. This last result holds for all F; for $F\neq {\mathbf Q}_p$, it implies that the representations of $\mathrm{GL}_2(F)$ obtained from the cohomology of the Drinfeld tower are not admissible contrary to the case $F = {\mathbf Q}_p$.

We show that the first-order logical theory of the binary overlap-free words (and, more generally, the $\alpha $-free words for rational $\alpha $, $2 < \alpha \leq 7/3$), is decidable. As a consequence, many results previously obtained about this class through tedious case-based proofs can now be proved “automatically,” using a decision procedure, and new claims can be proved or disproved simply by restating them as logical formulas.

In this article, we provide an explicit upper bound for $h_K \mathcal {R}_K d_K^{-1/2}$ which depends on an effective constant in the error term of the Ideal Theorem.

Let f be a non-CM Hecke eigencusp form of level 1 and fixed weight, and let $\{\lambda_f(n)\}_n$ be its sequence of normalised Fourier coefficients. We show that if $K/ \mathbb{Q}$ is any number field, and $\mathcal{N}_K$ denotes the collection of integers representable as norms of integral ideals of K, then a positive proportion of the positive integers $n \in \mathcal{N}_K$ yield a sign change for the sequence $\{\lambda_f(n)\}_{n \in \mathcal{N}_K}$. More precisely, for a positive proportion of $n \in \mathcal{N}_K \cap [1,X]$ we have $\lambda_f(n)\lambda_f(n') < 0$, where n′ is the first element of $\mathcal{N}_K$ greater than n for which $\lambda_f(n') \neq 0$.

For example, for $K = \mathbb{Q}(i)$ and $\mathcal{N}_K = \{m^2+n^2 \;:\; m,n \in \mathbb{Z}\}$ the set of sums of two squares, we obtain $\gg_f X/\sqrt{\log X}$ such sign changes, which is best possible (up to the implicit constant) and improves upon work of Banerjee and Pandey. Our proof relies on recent work of Matomäki and Radziwiłł on sparsely-supported multiplicative functions, together with some technical refinements of their results due to the author.

In a related vein, we also consider the question of sign changes along shifted sums of two squares, for which multiplicative techniques do not directly apply. Using estimates for shifted convolution sums among other techniques, we establish that for any fixed $a \neq 0$ there are $\gg_{f,\varepsilon} X^{1/2-\varepsilon}$ sign changes for $\lambda_f$ along the sequence of integers of the form $a + m^2 + n^2 \leq X$.

We give a new proof of Faltings's $p$-adic Eichler–Shimura decomposition of the modular curves via Bernstein–Gelfand–Gelfand (BGG) methods and the Hodge–Tate period map. The key property is the relation between the Tate module and the Faltings extension, which was used in the original proof. Then we construct overconvergent Eichler–Shimura maps for the modular curves providing ‘the second half’ of the overconvergent Eichler–Shimura map of Andreatta, Iovita and Stevens. We use higher Coleman theory on the modular curve developed by Boxer and Pilloni to show that the small-slope part of the Eichler–Shimura maps interpolates the classical $p$-adic Eichler–Shimura decompositions. Finally, we prove that overconvergent Eichler–Shimura maps are compatible with Poincaré and Serre pairings.