Distribution of the determinants of sums of matrices (Q2039473)

Summary: Let \(\mathbb{F}_q\) be an arbitrary finite field of order \(q\) and let \(M_2(\mathbb{F}_q)\) be the ring of all \(2\times 2\) matrices with entries in \(\mathbb{F}_q\). In this article, we study \(\det S\) for certain types of subsets \(S \subset M_2(\mathbb{F}_q)\). For \(i\in \mathbb{F}_q\), let \(D_i\) be the subset of \(M_2(\mathbb{F}_q)\) defined by \(D_i := \{x\in M_2(\mathbb{F}_q): \det(x)=i\}.\) We first show that when \(E\) and \(F\) are subsets of \(D_i\) and \(D_j\) for some \(i, j\in \mathbb{F}_q^*\), respectively, we have \[\det(E+F)=\mathbb{F}_q\] whenever \(|E| |F|\ge{15}^2q^4\), and then provide a concrete construction to show that our result is sharp. Secondly, as an application of the first result, we investigate the distribution of the determinants generated by the sum set \((E\cap D_i) + (F\cap D_j)\), when \(E\), \(F\) are subsets of the product type, i.e., \(U_1\times U_2\subseteq \mathbb{F}_q^2\times \mathbb{F}_q^2\) under the identification \(M_2(\mathbb{F}_q)=\mathbb{F}_q^2\times \mathbb{F}_q^2\). Lastly, as an extended version of the first result, we prove that if \(E\) is a set in \(D_i\) for \(i\ne 0\) and \(k\) is large enough, then we have \[\det(2kE):=\det(\underbrace{E + \dots + E}_{2k \text{ terms}}) \supseteq \mathbb{F}_q^*\] whenever the size of \(E\) is close to \(q^{3/2} \). Moreover, we show that, in general, the threshold \(q^{3/2}\) is the best possible. Our methods are based on discrete Fourier analysis.