Fluctuations in the number of points on smooth plane curves over finite fields (Q710489)

Let \(S_d\) be the set of homogeneous polynomials \(F(X,Y,Z)\) of degree \(d\) over \({\mathbb F}_q\), and let \(S_d^{\text{ns}}\subseteq S_d\) be the subset of polynomials corresponding to smooth curves \(C_F: F(X,Y,Z)=0\). The authors prove that when \(q\) and \(d\) tend to infinity and \(d>q^{1+\varepsilon}\), the limiting distribution of \[ \frac{\#C_F({\mathbb F}_q)-(q+1)}{\sqrt{q+1}} \] is a standard Gaussian distribution (mean \(0\), variance \(1\)).