We study the growth of $\unicode[STIX]{x0428}$ and $p^{\infty }$-Selmer groups for isogenous abelian varieties in towers of number fields, with an emphasis on elliptic curves. The growth types are usually exponential, as in the ‘positive ${\it\mu}$-invariant’ setting in the Iwasawa theory of elliptic curves. The towers we consider are $p$-adic and $l$-adic Lie extensions for $l\neq p$, in particular cyclotomic and other $\mathbb{Z}_{l}$-extensions.

In this article we explain how the results in our previous article on ‘algebraic Hecke characters and compatible systems of mod $p$ Galois representations over global fields’ allow one to attach a Hecke character to every cuspidal Drinfeld modular eigenform from its associated crystal that was constructed in earlier work of the author. On the technical side, we prove along the way a number of results on endomorphism rings of ${\it\tau}$-sheaves and crystals. These are needed to exhibit the close relation between Hecke operators as endomorphisms of crystals on the one side and Frobenius automorphisms acting on étale sheaves associated to crystals on the other. We also present some partial results on the ramification of Hecke characters associated to Drinfeld modular eigenforms. An important phenomenon absent from the case of classical modular forms is that ramification can also result from places of modular curves of good but non-ordinary reduction. In an appendix, jointly with Centeleghe we prove some basic results on $p$-adic Galois representations attached to $\text{GL}_{2}$-type cuspidal automorphic forms over global fields of characteristic $p$.

In previous work, Ohno conjectured, and Nakagawa proved, relations between thecounting functions of certain cubic fields. These relations may be viewed as complements to the Scholz reflection principle, and Ohno and Nakagawa deduced them as consequences of ‘extra functional equations’ involving the Shintani zeta functions associated to the prehomogeneous vector space of binary cubic forms. In the present paper, we generalize their result by proving a similar identity relating certain degree-$\ell$ fields to Galois groups $D_{\ell }$ and $F_{\ell }$, respectively, for any odd prime $\ell$; in particular, we give another proof of the Ohno–Nakagawa relation without appealing to binary cubic forms.

We prove by the Hilbert–Mumford criterion that a slope stable polarized weighted pointed nodal curve is Chow asymptotic stable. This generalizes the result of Caporaso on stability of polarized nodal curves and of Hassett on weighted pointed stable curves polarized by the weighted dualizing sheaves. It also solves a question raised by Mumford and Gieseker, to prove the Chow asymptotic stability of stable nodal curves by the Hilbert–Mumford criterion.

We prove that the higher direct images of the structure sheaf under a birational and projective morphism between excellent and regular schemes vanish.

Let $G$ be an algebraic real reductive group and $Z$ a real spherical $G$-variety, that is, it admits an open orbit for a minimal parabolic subgroup $P$. We prove a local structure theorem for $Z$. In the simplest case where $Z$ is homogeneous, the theorem provides an isomorphism of the open $P$-orbit with a bundle $Q\times _{L}S$. Here $Q$ is a parabolic subgroup with Levi decomposition $L\ltimes U$, and $S$ is a homogeneous space for a quotient $D=L/L_{n}$ of $L$, where $L_{n}\subseteq L$ is normal, such that $D$ is compact modulo center.

The new homotopy theory of exact$\infty$-categories is introduced and employed to prove a Theorem of the Heart for algebraic $K$-theory (in the sense of Waldhausen). This implies a new compatibility between Waldhausen $K$-theory and Neeman $K$-theory. Additionally, it provides a new proof of the Dévissage and Localization theorems of Blumberg–Mandell, new models for the $G$-theory of schemes, and a proof of the invariance of $G$-theory under derived nil-thickenings.