Central pairs, Galois theory and automorphic forms (Q1417651)

The main object of the paper under review is a central pair \((A,f)\) over a field \(k\) of characteristic zero, where \(A\) is a finite abelian group and \(f\colon A\times A\to k^*\) is a normalized central 2-cocycle. To any central pair one can associate the so-called twisted group algebra \((k,A,f)\) which as a \(k\)-vector space is generated by symbols \(e_x\), \(x\in A\), and the \(k\)-algebra structure is given by the relations \(e_xe_y=f(x,y)e_{xy}\), \(ae_x=e_xa\) for all \(x,y\in A\), \(a\in k\). This algebra is simple with center \(k\) if and only if \((A,f)\) is nondegenerate (i.e. if and only if the kernel \(R_f:=\{x\in A: \omega_f(x,y)=1 \quad \forall y\in A\}\) of the symplectic pairing \(\omega_f(x,y):=f(x,y)/f(y,x)\) is trivial). This construction gives, for example, all symbol algebras \[ A_\zeta (a,b)=\langle X,Y | X^m=a, Y^m=b, YX=\zeta XY\rangle, \] where \(a,b\in k\), \(\zeta\) is a primitive \(m\)th root of unity in \(k\). Furthermore, to a nondegenerate central pair \((A,f)\), such that \(\exp(A)\) is squarefree, the author associates an absolutely irreducible projective representation of the absolute Galois group \(G_k\) of \(k\). In the case when \(k\) is a number field, the author studies the liftings of these representations to linear representations of \(G_k\) and relates them to cuspidal automorphic representations.