Fitting ideals of \(p\)-ramified Iwasawa modules over totally real fields (Q2064038)

Let \(p\) be an odd prime and let \(K/k\) be a finite abelian extension of totally real number fields. Let \(K_{\infty}\) be the cyclotomic \(\mathbb{Z}_{p}\)-extension of \(K\) and let \(\mathcal{G} = \mathrm{Gal}(K_{\infty}/k)\). For any finite set \(S\) of places of \(k\), let \(X_{S}\) be the \(S\)-ramified Iwasawa module, which is by definition the Galois group of the maximal pro-\(p\)-abelian extension of \(K_{\infty}\) unramified outside \(S\). Recall that \(X_{S}\) is a module over the Iwasawa algebra \(\mathcal{R}=\mathbb{Z}_{p}[[\mathcal{G}]]\). Let \(S_{p}\) be the set of \(p\)-adic places of \(k\) and let \(S_{\mathrm{ram}}(K/k)\) be the set of finite places of \(k\) that are ramified in \(K\). The main theme of the article under review is to compute \(\mathrm{Fitt}_{\mathcal{R}}(X_{S_{p}})\), the Fitting ideal of the Iwasawa module \(X_{S_{p}}\). More precisely, the authors prove the following theorem. Let \(S\) be a finite set of places of \(K\) such that \(S \supset S_{p} \cup S_{\mathrm{ram}}(K/k)\) and \(S \neq S_{p}\). Put \(S' = S \setminus S_{p} \neq \emptyset\). Then we have \[ \mathrm{Fitt}_{\mathcal{R}}(X_{S_{p}}) = \mathrm{Fitt}^{[1]}_{\mathcal{R}}(\mathrm{Z}_{S'}^{0})\theta_{S}^{\mathrm{mod}}. \] We shall briefly explain the terms appearing on the right hand side of this equation, but first note that the main point of the theorem is that they are all computable in principle. For each finite place \(v\) of \(k\) with \(v \notin S_{p}\), let \(\mathcal{G}_{v}\) be the decomposition group of \(\mathcal{G}\) at \(v\). Note that \(\mathcal{G}_{v}\) is an open subgroup of \(\mathcal{G}\). Define \(\mathrm{Z}_{v}=\mathbb{Z}_{p}[\mathcal{G}/\mathcal{G}_{v}]\) and \(\mathrm{Z}_{S'} = \oplus_{v \in S'} \mathrm{Z}_{v}\), both of which are regarded as \(\mathcal{R}\)-modules. The \(\mathcal{R}\)-module \(\mathrm{Z}_{S'}^{0}\) is defined by the short exact sequence \[ 0 \longrightarrow \mathrm{Z}_{S'}^{0} \longrightarrow \mathrm{Z}_{S'} \longrightarrow \mathbb{Z}_{p} \longrightarrow 0, \] where the map \(\mathrm{Z}_{S'} \longrightarrow \mathbb{Z}_{p}\) is defined to be the augmentation map on each summand \(\mathrm{Z}_{v}\). The shifted Fitting ideal \(\mathrm{Fitt}_{\mathcal{R}}^{[1]}\) was introduced by the second author in [\textit{T. Kataoka}, Adv. Stud. Pure Math. 86, 413--465 (2020; Zbl 1469.11421)]. It is defined by certain resolutions and their syzygies. The integral element \(\theta_{S}^{\mathrm{mod}} \in \mathcal{R}\) is a kind of (modified) equivariant Iwasawa power series and can be viewed as an integral Stickelberger element. The proof of the main theorem uses the abelian equivariant main conjecture. Under a certain `\(\mu=0\)' hypothesis, this was known to be true, for example, by [\textit{J. Ritter} and \textit{A. Weiss}, Indag. Math., New Ser. 15, No. 4, 549--572 (2004; Zbl 1142.11369)]. Using the breakthrough work [\textit{S. Dasgupta} and \textit{M. Kakde}, ``On the Brumer-Stark conjecture'', Preprint, \url{arXiv:2010.00657}], \textit{A. Nickel} and the reviewer have recently shown that this also holds unconditionally [``An unconditional proof of the abelian equivariant Iwasawa main conjecture and applications'', Preprint, \url{arXiv:2010.03186}]. The authors also develop techniques to give an explicit description of \(\mathrm{Fitt}^{[1]}_{\mathcal{R}}(\mathrm{Z}_{S'}^{0})\) in certain situations. Indeed, in some nice cases, their methods produce a concrete list of generators. Moreover, in the case that \(K/k\) is cyclic \(p\)-extension and satisfies some mild conditions, they apply these methods to give a much more explicit version of the main result above.