Differential forms, linked fields, and the \(u\)-invariant (Q2407398)

In the paper under review the authors associate an Albert form to any pair of cyclic algebras of prime degree \(p\) over a field \(F\) with \(\mathrm{char}(F) = p\) which coincides with the classical Albert form when \(p = 2\) and proceed to prove that if every Albert form is isotropic then \(H^4(F) = 0\). Given a field \(F\), a quaternion algebra over \(F\) is a central simple \(F\)-algebra of degree \(2\). The maximal subfields of quaternion division algebras over \(F\) are quadratic field extensions of \(F\). Two quaternion \(F\)-algebras are called linked if they share a common maximal subfield. A field \(F\) is called linked if every two quaternion \(F\)-algebras are linked. The \(u\)-invariant of a field \(F\), denoted by \(u(F)\), can be defined as the maximal dimension of an anisotropic nonsingular quadratic form over \(F\) of finite order in \(W_q(F)\). It was proven in [\textit{R. Elman} and \textit{T. Y. Lam}, Invent. Math. 21, 125--137 (1973; Zbl 0267.10029)] that if \(F\) is a linked field with \(\mathrm{char}(F) \neq 2\) then the possible values \(u(F)\) can take are \(0, 1, 2, 4\) and \(8\), and later Faivre in his PhD thesis proved that if \(F\) is a linked field and \(I_q^4 F = 0\) then \(u(F)\) is either \(0,2,4\) or \(8\). The authors managed to successfully apply their main result to eliminate the \(I_q^4 F = 0\) assumption in the above mentioned theorem.