401-3370-17L  Arithmetic of Quadratic Forms

SemesterSpring Semester 2022
LecturersM. Akka Ginosar
Periodicitynon-recurring course
Language of instructionEnglish
CommentNumber of participants limited to 12. Registration to this seminar is closed, the participants have been selected. There is no waiting list.


AbstractIntroductory seminar about rational quadratic forms. P-adic numbers, Hasse's local to global principle and the finiteness of the genus will be discussed.
Learning objectiveQuadratic forms and the numbers they represent have been of interest to mathematicians for a long time. For example, which integers can be expressed as a sum of two squares of integers? Or as a sum of three squares? Lagrange's four-squares theorem for instance states that any positive integer can be expressed as a sum of four squares. Such questions motivated the development of many aspects of algebraic number theory.

In this seminar we follow the beautiful monograph of Cassels "Rational quadratic forms" and will treat the fundamental results concerning quadratic forms over the integers and the rationals such as Hasse's local to global principle and finiteness of the genus.
ContentThe seminar will mostly follow the book "Rational quadratic forms" by J.W.S. Cassels, particularly Chapters 1-9. Exercises in this book are an integral part of the seminar. Towards the end of the semester additional topics may be treated.
Lecture notesCassels, John William Scott. Rational quadratic forms. Vol. 13. Academic Pr, 1978.
LiteratureMain reference:
Cassels, John William Scott. Rational quadratic forms. Vol. 13. Academic Pr, 1978.
Additional references:

Kitaoka, Yoshiyuki. Arithmetic of quadratic forms. Vol. 106. Cambridge University Press, 1999.
Schulze-Pillot, Rainer. "Representation by integral quadratic forms - a survey." Contemporary Mathematics 344 (2004): 303-322.
Prerequisites / NoticeThe student is assumed to have attended courses on linear algebra and algebra (as taught at ETH for instance). Previous knowledge on p-adic numbers is not assumed.