An application of model theory to real and p-adic algebraic groups (Q909035)

The Tarski-Seidenberg theorem (in the real case) and the theorem of Macintyre in the p-adic case are used to give elementary proofs of the following results on a real, resp. p-adic semialgebraic group G: 1) the commutator subgroup of G is closed, 2) G is simple (as an abstract group) if and only if it has no closed normal subgroup, 3) if G is simple, then every homomorphism from G into a compact topological group is continuous.