Class invariants and cyclotomic unit groups from special values of modular units (Q1011955)

The author constructs modular units from solutions to higher order \(q\)-recurrence equations given by A. Selberg which are generalizations of the Rogers-Ramanujan identities. The author shows that they are modular functions with respect to principal congruence subgroups by expressing these solutions as quotients of theta constants, and also shows that some of them can be generators of the modular function fields by expressing them as products of Siegel functions. By specializing these modular units, he obtains class invariants and cyclotomic unit groups. As a corollary he provides a new proof of a result of \textit{S. Gupta} and \textit{D. Zagier} [Math. Comput. 60, No. 201, 385--398 (1993; Zbl 0819.11062)] concerning Gaussian periods.