On Knebusch's norm principle for quadratic forms over semi-local rings (Q2571403)

Knebusch's norm principle is a classical result about quadratic forms over fields. Given a field extension \(K\subseteq L\) (characteristic not 2) and a regular quadratic form \(q\) over \(K\), it uses the norm map of the field extension to establish a connection between the subgroups of \(K^\times\) and \(L^\times\) that are generated by the elements represented by \(q\) and its base extension \(q_L=q\otimes L\). The result is extended to finite extensions \(R\subseteq S\) of regular semilocal domains. The proof is done first for the special case of a simple extension and is then generalized to arbitrary extensions. The methods also yield a proof of the Grothendieck-Serre conjecture about the étale cohomology of the spinor groups associated with a regular semilocal domain and its quotient field.