Small representations of integers by integral quadratic forms

For each positive integer n n , let g Z ( n ) g_\mathbb {Z}(n) be the smallest integer such that if an integral quadratic form in n n variables can be written as a sum of squares of integral linear forms, then it can be written as a sum of g Z ( n ) g_\mathbb {Z}(n) squares of integral linear forms. We show that every positive definite integral quadratic form is equivalent to what we call a balanced Hermite–Korkin–Zolotarev-reduced form and use it to show that the growth of g Z ( n ) g_\mathbb {Z}(n) is at most an exponential of n \sqrt {n} . Our result improves the best known upper bound on g Z ( n ) g_\mathbb {Z}(n) which is on the order of an exponential of n n . We also define an analogous number g O ∗ ( n ) g_{\mathcal O}^*(n) for writing Hermitian forms over the ring of integers O \mathcal O of an imaginary quadratic field as sums of norms of integral linear forms, and when the class number of the imaginary quadratic field is 1 1 , we show that the growth of g O ∗ ( n ) g_{\mathcal O}^*(n) is at most an exponential of n \sqrt {n} . We also improve on results of both Conway and Sloane and Kim and Oh on s s -integrable lattices.

An integer may be represented by a quadratic form over each ring of p -adic integers and over the reals without being represented by this quadratic form over the integers. More generally, such failure of a local-global principle may occur for the representation of one integral quadratic form by another integral quadratic form. We show that many such examples may be accounted for by a Brauer–Manin obstruction for the existence of integral points on schemes defined over the integers. For several types of homogeneous spaces of linear algebraic groups, this obstruction is shown to be the only obstruction to the existence of integral points.

There are close relations between Bernoulli numbers and quadratic fields or quadratic forms. In order to explain those, we give a survey of the ideal theory of quadratic fields and quadratic forms. Since Gauss , it is well known that there is a deep relation between the ideal theory of quadratic fields (i.e. quadratic extensions of the rational number field) and integral quadratic forms. This is obvious for specialists, but textbooks which explain this in detail are rare. In most textbooks, they treat the correspondence of ideals only in the case of maximal orders (the ring of all integers) for which the description is simple and easy. This is very disappointing. We cannot see the whole picture of the theory of quadratic forms by such a restricted treatment and sometimes it causes misunderstanding. We need the full description of this kind of relation when we explain later the relation between L-functions of prehomogeneous vector spaces and the Bernoulli numbers. So it would be a good chance to try to explain the full relation here.

An integral quadratic form is called strictly n-regular if it primitively represents all quadratic forms in n variables that are primitively represented by its genus. For any $$n \ge 2$$ , it will be shown that there are only finitely many similarity classes of positive definite strictly n-regular integral quadratic forms in $$n + 4$$ variables. This extends the recent finiteness results for strictly regular quaternary quadratic forms by Earnest et al. (J Number Theory 144: 256–266, 2014).

A treatment by integral matrices is given for composition of pairs of integral quadratic forms with the same discriminant. The forms are associated with a pair of similar 2 × 2 matrices A B with irrational eigen values which generate the maximal order. The most general integral similarity between A B is given by a matrix whose entries are linear forms in two indeterminates with integral coefficients. This matrix is a compositum of two factors of the same nature. By equating determinants a composition of two quadratic forms results. The method can be generalized to n × n matrices.

This chapter presents various results about quadratic forms over a field complete with respect to a discrete valuation. The discussion is based on the assumption that K is a field of arbitrary characteristic which is complete with respect to a discrete valuation ν‎ and uses the usual convention that ν‎(0) = infinity. The chapter starts with a notation regarding the ring of integers of K and the natural map from it to the residue field, followed by a number of propositions regarding an anisotropic quadratic space. These include an anisotropic quadratic space with residual quadratic spaces, an unramified quadratic space of finite dimension, unramified finite-dimensional anisotropic quadratic forms over K, unramified anisotropic quadratic forms and a bilinear form, and a round quadratic space over K. The chapter concludes with a theorem that there exists an anisotropic quadratic form over K, unique up to isometry, and is non-singular.

Combinatorial Completions

SynopsisA formula is given for the number of genera of primitive integral binary quadratic forms of discriminant D which lie in a rational equivalence class. In particular, necessary and sufficient conditions for the genus and rational equivalence class to coincide are given in terms of the prime factorisation of D.

SynopsisWe compute the number of ℚ-classes of primitive integral binary quadratic forms of any discriminant and characterise when it coincides with the number of genera.

Root systems and inflations of non-negative quasi-Cartan matrices

We show that the theorem of Ellenberg and Venkatesh on representation of integral quadratic forms by integral positive definite quadratic forms is valid under weaker conditions on the represented form.

The aim of this work is to determine what free energy functionals are expressible as quadratic forms of the state functional \(I^t\) which is discussed in earlier papers. The single integral form is shown to include the functional \(\psi _F\) proposed a few years ago, and also a further category of functionals which are easily described but more complicated to construct. These latter examples exist only for certain types of materials. The double integral case is examined in detail, against the background of a new systematic approach developed recently for double integral quadratic forms in terms of strain history, which was used to uncover new free energy functionals. However, while, in principle, the same method should apply to free energies which can be given by quadratic forms in terms of \(I^t\), it emerges that this requirement is very restrictive; indeed, only the minimum free energy can be expressed in such a manner.

We introduce and study a canonical quadratic form, called the torsion quadratic form, of the determinant line of a flat vector bundle over a closed oriented odd-dimensional manifold. This quadratic form caries less information than the refined analytic torsion, introduced in our previous work, but is easier to construct and closer related to the combinatorial Farber-Turaev torsion. In fact, the torsion quadratic form can be viewed as an analytic analogue of the Poincare-Reidemeister scalar product, introduced by Farber and Turaev. Moreover, it is also closely related to the complex analytic torsion defined by Cappell and Miller and we establish the precise relationship between the two. In addition, we show that up to an explicit factor, which depends on the Euler structure, and a sign the Burghelea-Haller complex analytic torsion, whenever it is defined, is equal to our quadratic form. We conjecture a formula for the value of the torsion quadratic form at the Farber-Turaev torsion and prove some weak version of this conjecture. As an application we establish a relationship between the Cappell-Miller and the combinatorial torsions.

In this paper we describe an algorithm that quickly computes a maximal a \mathfrak {a} -valued lattice in an F F -vector space equipped with a non-degenerate bilinear form, where a \mathfrak {a} is a fractional ideal in a number field F F . We then apply this construction to give an algorithm to compute an a \mathfrak {a} -maximal lattice in a quadratic space over any number field F F where the prime p = 2 p=2 is unramified. We also develop the theory of p \mathfrak {p} -neighbors for a \mathfrak {a} -valued quadratic lattices at an arbitrary prime p \mathfrak {p} of O F \mathcal {O}_F (including when p ∣ 2 \mathfrak {p}\mid 2 ) and prove its close connection to the residual geometry of certain quadrics mod p \mathfrak {p} . Finally we give a well-known application of p \mathfrak {p} -neighboring lattices and exact mass formulas to compute a complete set of representatives for the classes in a given genus of (totally definite) quadratic O F \mathcal {O}_F -lattices.

On the scaled trace forms and the transfer of a number field extension