Distribution of short sums of classical Kloosterman sums of prime powers moduli (Q2292683)

This article proves a qualitative and a quantitative result on the distribution of short sums of Kloosterman sums whose moduli are fixed powers of a sequence of prime numbers tending to infinity. Let \(n\geq 2\) be a fixed integer and \(\mathcal{P}\) be the set of prime numbers. For any \(p\in\mathcal{P}\), for any subset \(I_{p^n}\) of \(\left(\mathbb{Z}/p^n\mathbb{Z}\right)\), let \[ S(I_{p^n})=\frac{1}{\sqrt{\# I_{p^n}}}\sum_{a\in I_{p^n}}\frac{1}{p^{n/2}}\sum_{\substack{x\in\left(\mathbb{Z}/p^n\mathbb{Z}\right)^\times\\ x\overline{x}=1}}\exp\left(2\pi i\frac{ax+\overline{x}}{p^n}\right). \] We see \(\left(\mathbb{Z}/p^n\mathbb{Z}\right)^\times\) as a probability space endowed with the uniform measure and define the real-valued random variable \[ \begin{array}{ccccc} S[I_{p^n}] & \colon & \left(\mathbb{Z}/p^n\mathbb{Z}\right)^\times & \to & \mathbb{R}\\ & & t & \mapsto & S(I_{p^n}+t). \end{array} \] The qualitative result is the following. Consider a sequence \(\left(I_{p^n}\right)_{p\in\mathcal{P}}\) such that every difference of two different elements of \(I_{p^n}\) is invertible, and \[ \lim_{p\to+\infty}\frac{\log\# I_{p^n}}{\log p}=0. \] Then, the sequence of real-valued random variables \(\left(S[I_{p^n}]\right)_{p\in\mathcal{P}}\) converges in law to a standard Gaussian real-valued random variable: for every continuous real-valued function \(\varphi\) bounded on \(\mathbb{R}\), we have \[ \lim_{p\to +\infty}\frac{1}{\varphi(p^n)}\sum_{t\in \left(\mathbb{Z}/p^n\mathbb{Z}\right)^\times}\varphi\left(S(I_{p^n}+t)\right)=\frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi}}\int_{\mathbb{R}}\varphi(t)\exp\left(-\frac{t^2}{2}\right)d t. \] The quantitative version is the following, under the same hypothesis: \begin{multline*} \frac{1}{\varphi(p^n)}\#\left\{t\in \left(\mathbb{Z}/p^n\mathbb{Z}\right)^\times \colon \alpha\leq S(I_{p^n}+t)\leq\beta\right\}= \frac{1}{\sqrt{2\pi}}\int_\alpha^\beta\exp\left(-\frac{t^2}{2}\right)d t\\+O_\epsilon\left(\max\left(\frac{1}{\# I_{p^n}},\left(\frac{\log\# I_{p^n}}{\log p}\right)^{3/4}\right)+p^{-\beta_n+3\epsilon}+\frac{\beta-\alpha}{\sqrt{\# I_{p^n}}}\right) \end{multline*} for any real numbers \(\alpha<\beta\) and for any \(0<\varepsilon>\beta_n/3\) where \[ \beta_n=\begin{cases} 1/2 & \text{if \(2\leq n\leq 5\),}\\ \frac{4(n-1)}{2^n} & \text{otherwise.} \end{cases} \] Ricotta's results complement the ones by \textit{C. Perret-Gentil} [Math. Proc. Camb. Philos. Soc. 163, No. 3, 385--422 (2017; Zbl 1405.11102)]. Perret-Gentil proved the same results when the Koosterman sums are on the fields \(\mathbb{F}_{p^n}\) instead as of the rings \(\left(\mathbb{Z}/p^n\mathbb{Z}\right)^\times\). The main ingredient is an asymptotic evaluation of the complete sums of products of shifted Kloosterman sums. To obtain this evaluation, the author uses an explicit formula for the Kloosterman sums. The proof relies on the Riemann hypothesis for curves over finite fields proved by Deligne.