A uniform estimate for the density of rational points on quadrics (Q2199498)

In the study of the rational points of smooth projective surfaces over number fields, del Pezzo surfaces sits on the opposite side of the hyperbolic ones: while the latter are expected to have very few rationals points, the former have lot of them and so it is interesting to try and estimate how many of them there are. In the paper under consideration, the author studies the non-trivial example of del Pezzo surfaces \(X_Q\subseteq \mathbb P_{\mathbb Q}^3\) defined by a non-singular quadratic form \(Q\in \mathbb Z[x_1,x_2,x_3,x_4]\). For every integer \(B>0\) define \[N(X_Q, B):=\vert \{\underline x:= (x_1,\dots,x_4)\in \mathbb Z^4_{\mathrm{prim}}\text{ such that } \max_{1 \leq i\leq 4}( \vert x_i\vert)\leq B \text{ and } Q(\underline x)=0\} \vert,\] where \(\mathbb Z^4_{\mathrm{prim}}\subseteq \mathbb Z^4\) is the subset of primitive elements. Since \(\mathrm{Pic}(X_Q)\) is of rank \(2\) or \(1\) depending on whether \(\mathrm{disc}(Q)\) is a square or not, Manin's conjecture predicts that there exists a \(c_Q\in \mathbb R_{\geq 0}\) such that \[ N(X_Q, B)\sim \begin{cases} c_QB^2\log(B)&\text{if \(\mathrm{disc}(Q)\) is a square}\\ c_QB^2&\text{if \(\mathrm{disc}(Q)\) is not a square} \end{cases} \] as \(B\to +\infty\). While this can be proved using results of \textit{D. R. Heath-Brown} [J. Reine Angew. Math. 481, 149--206 (1996; Zbl 0857.11049)], the constant \(c_Q\) resulting from his work seems to depend on the quadric \(Q\), hence it is not uniform on \(X_Q\). In another work [Ann. Math. (2) 155, No. 2, 553--598 (2002; Zbl 1039.11044)] \textit{D. R. Heath-Brown} proved that \(N(X_Q, B)\ll_{\varepsilon} B^{2+\varepsilon}\) where the implied constant depends only on \(\varepsilon\) (and not on \(Q\)). In the paper under review, it is proved that \[ N(X_Q, B)\ll \begin{cases} B^2\log(B)&\text{if \(\mathrm{disc}(Q)\) is a square}\\ B^2&\text{if \(\mathrm{disc}(Q)\) is not a square} \end{cases} \] where the implied constant is absolute. This confirms a conjecture of by \textit{T. D. Browning} and \textit{D. R. Heath-Brown} [Discrete Anal. 2018, Paper No. 15, 29 p. (2018; Zbl 1444.11142)].