Irreducible polynomials over a finite field and an analogue of Gauss sums over a field of characteristic 2 (Q1190741)

Let \(k=F_ q\) be a finite field of \(q=p^ s\) elements, where \(p=\text{char } k\). For fixed \(a_ 1,a_ 2\in k\) denote \(H_ n(a_ 1,a_ 2)\) the number of irreducible polynomials \(f(x)=x^ n+a_ 1 x^{n-1}+a_ 2 x^{n-2}+t_ 3 x^{n-3}+ \dots+ t_ n\in k[x]\). For \(a\in k\) let \(\delta(a,n)=q^{n-2}+(-1)^ n (q^{n-2}-Q_{n-1}(a))\), where \(Q_ n(a)\) denotes the number of solutions in \(k^ n\) of the equation \(\sum_{i=1}^ n x_ i^ 2+ \sum_{1\leq i<j\leq n} x_ i x_ j=a\). The main result of this paper are explicit formulae for \(H_ n(a_ 1,a_ 2)\). Their form depend on the parity of the characteristic of \(k\) and on the gcd of \(p\) and \(n\), therefore we are given here only one case. Let \(\text{char }k=p>2\). If \((p,n)=1\) then for all \(a\in k\) \[ H_ n(0,- a)={1\over n} \sum_{d\mid n} \mu(d)\delta(a/d,n/d), \] where \(\mu(d)\) denotes the Möbius function.