The elementary obstruction and the Weil restriction (Q1003156)

The main object of the paper under review is a smooth, geometrically integral variety \(X\) over a field \(k\). The author is interested in the elementary obstruction to the existence of a rational point. This obstruction was introduced by \textit{J.-L.~Colliot-Thélène} and \textit{J.-J.~Sansuc} [Duke Math. J. 54, 375--492 (1987; Zbl 0659.14028)] and is defined either as the class \(\text{{ob}}(X)\) of the exact sequence of \(\Gamma\)-modules (\(\Gamma\) is the absolute Galois group of \(k\)) \[ 1\to \bar k^\times \to \bar k(X)^\times \to \bar k(X)^\times /\bar k^\times \to 1 \] in \(\text{{Ext}}^1_{\Gamma}(\bar k(X)^\times /\bar k^\times, \bar k^\times )\), or (if \(k[X]^\times =\bar k^\times\)) as the class \(e(X)\) of the exact sequence \[ 1\to \bar k^\times \to \bar k(X)^\times \to \text{{Div}}(\overline X) \to \text{Pic}(\overline X) \to 1 \] in \(\text{{Ext}}^2_{\Gamma}(\text{{Pic}}(\overline X), \bar k^\times )\) . The author addresses the problem of behaviour of the elementary obstruction under the Weil restriction of scalars. Towards this end, he first considers its behaviour with respect to taking direct products and shows that if either (i) \(X\) is projective and \(\text{Pic}^{0}(X)=0\), or (ii) \(X\) is quasiprojective, \(k\) is of characteristic zero, and \(\text{{Pic}}(\overline X)\) is finitely generated, then \(e(X\times_kY)=0\) if and only if \(e(X)=e(Y)=0\). This allows him to deduce the main result: assuming (i) or (ii), for any finite extension \(k'/k\) the obstructions \(e(X)\) and \(e(R_{k'/k}(X\times _kk'))\) coincide (in the sense that the second one is the image of the first one under some natural isomorphism). In particular, one of them vanishes if and only if the other does.