A counterexample to the local-global principle of linear dependence for abelian varieties (Q847087): Difference between revisions

Let \(A\) be an Abelian variety defined over a number field \(k\), let \(P\) be a point in \(A(k)\), and let \(X\) be a subgroup of \(A(k)\). Given a residue field \(\tilde{k}\), let us denote by \(\tilde X\) the image of \(X\) under the reduction: \(A(k) \to A(\tilde{k})\). In 2002, Gajda and Kowalski asked whether it is true that \textit{\(P\) is a point in \(X\) if and only \(P\) is reduced to a point in \(\tilde X\) for all but finitely many residue fields \(\tilde{k}\).} In [\textit{P. Jossen}, On the arithmetic of 1-motives, Ph.D. thesis, Central European University Budapest (2009)], it is shown that the answer is positive for simple Abelian varieties. In the paper under review, the authors present a counterexample when \(A\) is not simple, using \(A:= E\times E \times E\) where \(E\) is an elliptic curve over \(\mathbb Q\) with Mordell-Weil rank at least \(3\) such as \(E : y^2+y = x^3-7x+6\). Let \(E\) be an elliptic curve with three points \(P_1,P_2,P_3\) (of infinite order) which are \(\mathbb Z\)-linearly independent. Let \(P\) be a column vector with entries \(P_1,P_2,P_3\), so that \(P\) can be considered as a point in \(A(k)\). Let \[ X:=\{ MP \in A(k) : M \in \text{Mat}(3,\mathbb Z),\;\text{tr}(M)=0\} \] The linear independence of \(P_i\)'s and the condition \(\text{tr}(M)=0\) imply that \(P\) does not belong to \(X\). However, under reduction, \(\tilde P = M \tilde P \) can happen, and it is proved in the paper using quite simple arithmetic and the torsion structure of \(E[\ell](\tilde{k})\) where \(\ell\) is an arbitrary prime.