On orthogonal invariants in characteristic 2 (Q1883013)

As a byproduct of their study of invariant theory of matrices in positive characteristic, \textit{M. Domokos, S. G. Kuzmin, A. N. Zubkov} [J. Pure Appl. Algebra 176, No. 1, 61--80 (2002; Zbl 1024.16014)] discovered an interesting consequence for invariant theory of the special orthogonal group. Roughly speaking, the invariants in characteristic \(p>2\) behave as in characteristic 0 and the situation changes drastically in characteristic 2. In the paper under review the authors concentrate their efforts on invariant theory of the orthogonal group \(O(n)\) and the special orthogonal group \(SO(n)\) over an algebraically closed field \(k\) of characteristic 2, with the natural action of \(O(n)\) and \(SO(n)\) on the \(m\)-fold direct sum \(k^n\oplus\cdots\oplus k^n\) of the standard \(n\)-dimensional vector representation. (The subgroup \(SO(n)\) of \(O(n)\) coincides with \(O(n)\) for \(n\) odd and is of index 2 for \(n\) even.) The authors describe explicitly the algebras of \(O(n)\)- and \(SO(n)\)-invariants for \(n\leq 3\). They establish that for \(n\leq 4\) and \(m\) going to infinity, there exist invariants of arbitrary high degree (depending on \(m\)) which cannot be expressed in terms of invariants of lower degree. This supports the conjecture that the same phenomena occur for all \(n\). As another confirmation for this conjecture, the authors construct for any even \(n\) new \(O(n)\)-invariants which are not expressible as polynomials of quadratic invariants. In contrast with these results, the authors show that the rational invariants behave in the same way in all characteristics. Similarly, for small \(m\) (\(\leq n\)), the algebra of \(O(n)\)-invariants is generated by the quadratic invariants. For all \(n\) the algebra of \(O(n)\)- and \(SO(n)\)-invariants is a finitely generated module over the subalgebra generated by the quadratic invariants. In particular, for odd \(n\) the square of any \(SO(n)\)-invariant belongs to this subalgebra. The authors also give an \(n\)-linear \(SO(n)\)-invariant which distinguishes between \(SO(n)\) and \(O(n)\).