The Hilbert modular group and orthogonal groups (Q2153908)

From Lie theory one obtains abstract isomorphisms between the special orthogonal group \(\mathrm{SO}_{2,2}(\mathbb{R})\) associated to a real quadratic space \((V,q)\) of signature \((2,2)\) and the projective special linear group \(\mathrm{PSL}_2(\mathbb{R} \oplus \mathbb{R})\) of the étale \(\mathbb{R}\)-algebra \(\mathbb{R} \oplus \mathbb{R}\). This isomorphism descends to isomorphisms between lattices in \(\mathrm{SO}_{2,2}(\mathbb{R})\) and \(\mathrm{PSL}_2(\mathbb{R} \oplus \mathbb{R})\). In applications to modular forms such isomorphisms are highly useful, as they build a bridge between orthogonal modular forms and Hilbert modular forms. Individual cases are strayed in the literature. The authors offer a more systematic treatment and overview. Given a real quadratic field \(K\) with maximal order \(\mathcal{O}_K\), we identify \(\mathcal{O}_K \otimes \mathbb{R}\) with \(\mathbb{R} \oplus \mathbb{R}\). Note that a suitable trace form on \(\mathcal{O}_K \oplus \mathbb{Z} \oplus \mathbb{Z}\) yields an integral structure \(L_K \subset V\) of \((V,q)\). There is a lattice \(\mathrm{PSL}_2(\mathcal{O}_K)^\ast\) extending \(\mathrm{PSL}_2(\mathcal{O}_K) \subseteq \mathrm{PSL}_2(\mathbb{R} \oplus \mathbb{R})\) which is defined by involutions that the authors provide in (8). The first main result is Theorem 2, which relates \(\mathrm{PSL}_2(\mathcal{O}_K)^\ast\) with an index~\(2\) subgroup of special orthogonal group of \(L_K\), and \(\mathrm{PSL}_2(\mathcal{O}_K)\) with its discriminant kernel, which is recalled in (1). The second main result in Theorem 3 extends this relation to congruence subgroups of \(\mathrm{PSL}_2(\mathcal{O}_K)\) and special orthogonal groups for integral structures associated with the sublattice \(\mathcal{O}_K \oplus N \mathbb{Z} \oplus \mathbb{Z}\) of \(L_K\).