Unlikely intersections between additive and multiplicative structures (Q2681248)

Let \(K\) be a finitely generated field extension over \(\mathbb{F}_p\), \(\phi\) the \(p\)-Frobenius map and \(M\) a finitely generated \(\mathbb{F}_p[\phi]\)-submodule of \(K\) with infinitely many elements. Suppose that there is some \(n_0\in \mathbb{N}\) such that \(M \cap K^{p^{n_0}} \subseteq \phi(M)\). In this paper, it is proved that for every positive-dimensional irreducible indecomposable algebraic subgroup \(G \subseteq \mathbb{G}_m^N\) naturally embedded in \( \mathbb{A}^N\), exactly one of the following two conditions hold: (1) If \(N = 1\), then \(G = \mathbb{G}_m\); otherwise, up to a permutation on the coordinates \(\{X_1, \ldots , X_N\}\) on \(\mathbb{A}^N\), there are integers \(0 \leq n_2 \leq n_3 \leq \ldots \leq n_N\) such that \(G\) is defined by \(X_i = \phi^{n_i}(X_1)\), \(i \in \{2,\ldots, N\}\). (2) We can construct a \(K\)-subvariety \(V\) of \(G\) of lower dimension such that \[G(M) = \{(\phi^n(x_1), \ldots , \phi^n(x_N)) : (x_1,\ldots , x_N) \in V (M), n \geq 0\}.\] The proof uses the technique of derivations. First the case where \(G\) is defined by one equation is treated, and in this part, the technical hypothesis \(M \cap K^{p^{n_0}} \subseteq \phi(M)\) is used. For the general case, it is shown that \(G\) has always a triangular system of defining equations with some extra properties, which lead to Condition 2 from the result for the codimension-one case, unless Condition 1 is reached.