Some new results on ordered fields (Q1090367)

The author begins by asking whether there are real closed non-archimedean fields whose only automorphism is the identity. He then constructs an example of a non-archimedean ordered field with this property. He next defines a) the Bolzano property and b) the maximum principle of an ordered field F as: a) every polynomial over F which has opposite signs at two values in F, has a zero between these two values; b) every polynomial over F attains a maximum on each closed interval. He then shows that a), b) and being real closed are equivalent. The last part of the paper deals with EP fields: a field F, is said to be EP, if every automorphism of the rational function field over F in one variable sends F onto itself. In an earlier paper, the author and \textit{T. Recio} [J. Pure Appl. Algebra 30, 237-246 (1983; Zbl 0533.12018)], had already shown that algebraically closed fields, algebraic number fields, Euclidean fields, and fields with a unique ordering, archimedean over the rationals, are EP. Here he shows that finite fields, fields F with a unique ordering such that card Hom(F,F) is strictly less than card F, and n-fields are all EP. In this context, an n-field F is one where \(x^ n- ax-1=0\) has a zero in F, for all a in F and some fixed natural number n. The paper ends with two unsettled questions.