Midwest cousins of Barnes-Wall lattices (Q2268803)

In this article, lattice means a finite rank free abelian group with rational-valued positive definite symmetric bilinear form. The author develops a general lattice construction method inspired by finite group theory called {``midwest procedure''} referring to the fact that many significant developments in finite group theory took place in the American midwest during the twentieth century. The idea is to start with a lattice \(L\) and take a finite subgroup \(F\) of \(O(\mathbb Q\otimes L)\). In the rational span of \(F\) in \(\text{End}(\mathbb Q\otimes L)\), we take an element \(h\). We define a new lattice \(L'\), in some way using \(L\) and \(h\), for example \(L\cap \text{Ker}(h), L^*\cap \text{Ker}(h), Lh\) or sums of such things. After a finite number of iterations of this procedure, the sequence \(L, L',\dots\) arrives at a new lattice called a \textit{midwest cousin} of \(L\). In this article, the author restricts the procedure to the following \textit{\underbar midwest \underbar cousins} (MC): Let \(L\) be an integral lattice. Let \(t,f\in O(L)\) so that \(t,f\) commutes, \(t\) is an involution and \(f\) a fourvolution. Let \(\varepsilon=\pm\) and let \(P^\varepsilon\) be the orthogonal projection to \(V^\varepsilon(t)=\mathbb Q\otimes L^\varepsilon(t)\) where \(L^{\varepsilon(t)}\) is the eigenlattice for involution \(t\). The midwest cousins are defined by \[ MC(L,t,f,\varepsilon):= L^\varepsilon(t)+P^\varepsilon(L)(f-1)=L^\varepsilon(t)+P^\varepsilon(L(f-1)). \] The midwest first cousins of the Barnes-Wall lattices are the MC lattices with input lattice \(BW_{2^d}\) (the Barnes-Wall lattice of rank \(2^d\)) and a pair \(t,f\) as above where \(t\) is a positive trace defect \(k\) involution and \(f\) is a lower fourvolution. See [\textit{E. S. Barnes} and \textit{G. E. Wall}, ``Some extreme forms defined in terms of abelian groups'', J. Aust. Math. Soc. 1, 47--63 (1959; Zbl 0109.03304)], [\textit{R. L. Griess, jun.}, ``Involutions on the Barnes-Wall lattices and their fixed point sublattices. I'', Pure Appl. Math. Q. 1, No. 4, 989--1022 (2005; Zbl 1149.11033)] and [\textit{R. L. Griess, jun.}, ``Pieces of \(2^d\): Existence and uniqueness for Barnes-Wall lattices and Ypsilanti lattices'', Adv. Math. 196, No. 1, 147--192 (2005; Zbl 1076.11043), Corrections and additions, Adv. Math. 211, No. 2, 819--824 (2007; Zbl 1193.11070)] for more details on the background. The author specializes further to the Barnes-Wall dimension \(2^d\) lattices \(BW_{2^d}\) and the Bolt-Room-Wall groups \(BRW^+(2^d)\), which are the full isometry groups of \(BW_{2^d}\) if \(d\not=3\). The author creates multi-parameter series of cousin lattices, called \textit{the first cousins of the Barnes-Wall lattices}. The dimension of a first cousin is \(2^{d-1}\pm 2^{d-k-1}\) for some \(k\in\{1,2,\dots \lfloor\frac{d}{2}\rfloor\}\). The auxiliary finite isometry groups \(F_i\) are cyclic groups of order \(2\) and \(4\). When \(d\) is odd and \(d-2k\geq 3\), the minimum norms are \(2^{\lfloor\frac{d}{2}\rfloor-1}\) and the lattices are even and unimodular. The author includes a partial analysis of minimal vectors.