Conference proceedings based on the 1996 LMS Durham Symposium 'Galois representations in arithmetic algebraic geometry'.

The articles in this volume are expanded versions of lectures delivered at the Graduate Summer School and at the Mentoring Program for Women in Mathematics held at the Institute for Advanced Study/Park City Mathematics Institute. The theme of the program was arithmetic algebraic geometry. The choice of lecture topics was heavily influenced by the recent spectacular work of Wiles on modular elliptic curves and Fermat's Last Theorem. The main emphasis of the articles in the volume is on elliptic curves, Galois representations, and modular forms. One lecture series offers an introduction to these objects. The others discuss selected recent results, current research, and open problems and conjectures. The book would be a suitable text for an advanced graduate topics course in arithmetic algebraic geometry.

Modular forms are tremendously important in various areas of mathematics, from number theory and algebraic geometry to combinatorics and lattices. Their Fourier coefficients, with Ramanujan's tau-function as a typical example, have deep arithmetic significance. Prior to this book, the fastest known algorithms for computing these Fourier coefficients took exponential time, except in some special cases. The case of elliptic curves (Schoof's algorithm) was at the birth of elliptic curve cryptography around 1985. This book gives an algorithm for computing coefficients of modular forms of level one in polynomial time. For example, Ramanujan's tau of a prime number p can be computed in time bounded by a fixed power of the logarithm of p. Such fast computation of Fourier coefficients is itself based on the main result of the book: the computation, in polynomial time, of Galois representations over finite fields attached to modular forms by the Langlands program. Because these Galois representations typically have a nonsolvable image, this result is a major step forward from explicit class field theory, and it could be described as the start of the explicit Langlands program. The computation of the Galois representations uses their realization, following Shimura and Deligne, in the torsion subgroup of Jacobian varieties of modular curves. The main challenge is then to perform the necessary computations in time polynomial in the dimension of these highly nonlinear algebraic varieties. Exact computations involving systems of polynomial equations in many variables take exponential time. This is avoided by numerical approximations with a precision that suffices to derive exact results from them. Bounds for the required precision--in other words, bounds for the height of the rational numbers that describe the Galois representation to be computed--are obtained from Arakelov theory. Two types of approximations are treated: one using complex uniformization and another one using geometry over finite fields. The book begins with a concise and concrete introduction that makes its accessible to readers without an extensive background in arithmetic geometry. And the book includes a chapter that describes actual computations.

Extremely carefully written, masterfully thought out, and skillfully arranged introduction … to the arithmetic of algebraic curves, on the one hand, and to the algebro-geometric aspects of number theory, on the other hand. … an excellent guide for beginners in arithmetic geometry, just as an interesting reference and methodical inspiration for teachers of the subject … a highly welcome addition to the existing literature. —Zentralblatt MATH The interaction between number theory and algebraic geometry has been especially fruitful. In this volume, the author gives a unified presentation of some of the basic tools and concepts in number theory, commutative algebra, and algebraic geometry, and for the first time in a book at this level, brings out the deep analogies between them. The geometric viewpoint is stressed throughout the book. Extensive examples are given to illustrate each new concept, and many interesting exercises are given at the end of each chapter. Most of the important results in the one-dimensional case are proved, including Bombieri's proof of the Riemann Hypothesis for curves over a finite field. While the book is not intended to be an introduction to schemes, the author indicates how many of the geometric notions introduced in the book relate to schemes, which will aid the reader who goes to the next level of this rich subject.

This classic book contains an introduction to systems of l-adic representations, a topic of great importance in number theory and algebraic geometry, as reflected by the spectacular recent developments on the Taniyama-Weil conjecture and Fermat's Last Theorem. The initial chapters are devoted to the Abelian case (complex multiplication), where one

A detailed and self-contained introduction to a key part of local number theory, ideal for graduate students and researchers.

​This book discusses the p-adic modular forms, the eigencurve that parameterize them, and the p-adic L-functions one can associate to them. These theories and their generalizations to automorphic forms for group of higher ranks are of fundamental importance in number theory. For graduate students and newcomers to this field, the book provides a solid introduction to this highly active area of research. For experts, it will offer the convenience of collecting into one place foundational definitions and theorems with complete and self-contained proofs. Written in an engaging and educational style, the book also includes exercises and provides their solution.

This volume contains the expanded lectures given at a conference on number theory and arithmetic geometry held at Boston University. It introduces and explains the many ideas and techniques used by Wiles, and to explain how his result can be combined with Ribets theorem and ideas of Frey and Serre to prove Fermats Last Theorem. The book begins with an overview of the complete proof, followed by several introductory chapters surveying the basic theory of elliptic curves, modular functions and curves, Galois cohomology, and finite group schemes. Representation theory, which lies at the core of the proof, is dealt with in a chapter on automorphic representations and the Langlands-Tunnell theorem, and this is followed by in-depth discussions of Serres conjectures, Galois deformations, universal deformation rings, Hecke algebras, and complete intersections. The book concludes by looking both forward and backward, reflecting on the history of the problem, while placing Wiles'theorem into a more general Diophantine context suggesting future applications. Students and professional mathematicians alike will find this an indispensable resource.

One of the most exciting new subjects in Algebraic Number Theory and Arithmetic Algebraic Geometry is the theory of Euler systems. Euler systems are special collections of cohomology classes attached to p-adic Galois representations. Introduced by Victor Kolyvagin in the late 1980s in order to bound Selmer groups attached to p-adic representations, Euler systems have since been used to solve several key problems. These include certain cases of the Birch and Swinnerton-Dyer Conjecture and the Main Conjecture of Iwasawa Theory. Because Selmer groups play a central role in Arithmetic Algebraic Geometry, Euler systems should be a powerful tool in the future development of the field. Here, in the first book to appear on the subject, Karl Rubin presents a self-contained development of the theory of Euler systems. Rubin first reviews and develops the necessary facts from Galois cohomology. He then introduces Euler systems, states the main theorems, and develops examples and applications. The remainder of the book is devoted to the proofs of the main theorems as well as some further speculations. The book assumes a solid background in algebraic Number Theory, and is suitable as an advanced graduate text. As a research monograph it will also prove useful to number theorists and researchers in Arithmetic Algebraic Geometry.