Rost nilpotence and free theories (Q1622845)

The classical Rost nilpotence states that for \(X\) a smooth projective quadric over a field of characteristic not \(2\), any cycle in the middle-dimensional Chow group of \(X\times X\) which vanishes over a field extension is indeed nilpotent. In this paper, the authors establish such a principle for projective homogeneous varieties in characteristic \(0\), with Chow groups replaced by other cohomology theories: given a field \(k\), a coherent extended oriented cohomology theory over \(k\) is an oriented cohomology theory defined for schemes smooth over finitely generated field extensions of \(k\) as in 2.4, which satisfies the condition to be coherent in 2.6. The main theorem (4.4) states that if such a theory is in addition generically constant (i.e. its values over fields is invariant under field extensions) and \(k\) has characteristic \(0\), then the Rost nilpotence holds for projective homogeneous spaces. Examples are given by Chow groups, algebraic cobordism groups ([\textit{M. Levine} and \textit{F. Morel}, Algebraic cobordism. Berlin: Springer (2007; Zbl 1188.14015)]) and the group \(K_0\), and more generally free theories which are obtained from algebraic cobordism by base change (2.13).