A note on the mean value of \(L(\frac{1}{2}, \chi)\) in the real hyperelliptic ensemble (Q2308846)

The aim of this paper is the study of \(L\big(\frac 12,\chi_D\big)\), where \(D\) runs over monic polynomials of degree \(2m+2\) as \(m\to\infty\). It is of interest in analytic number theory to estimate moments of families of \(L\)-functions. In particular, if \(L(s,\chi_d)\) is the family of quadratic Dirichlet \(L\)-functions, where \(\chi_d\) is a real primitive Dirichlet character modulo \(|d|\) defined by the Kronecker symbol \(\chi_d(n)=\big(\frac dn\big)\), the problem of mean values is the study of the asymptotic behavior of \(\sum_{0<d\leq D}L\big(\frac 12,\chi_D\big)^k\) as \(D\to \infty\), where the sum is taken over over positive fundamental discriminants \(d\). The analogous problem for global function fields is to find asymptotic formulae for \(\sum_{D\in{\mathcal H}_{2m+1}}L\big(\frac 12,\chi_D\big)^k\) as \(|D|=q^{\deg (D)}\to \infty\), where \({\mathcal H}_{2m+1}\) is the set of monic, square-free polynomials of degree \(2m+1\) in \({\mathbb F}_q[t]\), \(q\) odd. The author studies the corresponding sums over \({\mathcal H}_{2m+2}\), which are also of interest. For \({\mathcal H}_{2m+1}\), \textit{A. M. Florea} [Int. Math. Res. Not. 2017, No. 20, 6119--6148 (2017; Zbl 1405.11104)] found, when \(q\equiv 1\bmod 4\) is a prime, that there exists an extra term of size \(mq^{2m/3}\) and bounded the error term by \(q^{\frac m2(1+\varepsilon)}\) for any \(\varepsilon >0\) in the asymptotic formula given by \textit{J. C. Andrade} and \textit{J. P. Keating} [J. Number Theory 132, No. 12, 2793--2816 (2012; Zbl 1278.11082)]. In the paper under review, the author extends Florea's method to \({\mathcal H}_{2m+2}\) when \(q\equiv 1\bmod 4\) is a prime and finds that there exists an extra term of size \(mq^{2m/3}\) in the asymptotic formula found by the author in [J. Number Theory 133, No. 8, 2706--2714 (2013; Zbl 1286.11197)] and bounds the error term by \(q^{\frac 12(1+\varepsilon)}\) for any \(\varepsilon >0\). The main result is Theorem 1.1 and its proof is given in Section 4.