scientific article; zbMATH DE number 1182552

Publication date 18 March 1999

Full work available at URL http://www.numdam.org/item?id=SB_1996-1997__39__105_0, https://eudml.org/doc/110226

algebraic independence automorphic functions Eisenstein series elliptic modular function Mahler-Manin conjecture survey transcendence

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Modular and automorphic functions (11F03) Holomorphic modular forms of integral weight (11F11) Algebraic independence; Gel'fond's method (11J85) Transcendence theory of elliptic and abelian functions (11J89) Transcendence theory of other special functions (11J91) Gamma, beta and polygamma functions (33B15)

Review text

This is a very useful survey -- including some new proofs -- about old and new transcendence and algebraic independence results concerning automorphic functions. The author starts with \textit{Th. Schneider's} [Math. Ann. 113, 1--13 (1936; Zbl 0014.20402)] transcendence result concerning \(j(\tau)\) where \(j\) is the elliptic modular function and \(\tau\) algebraic but not imaginary quadratic. Then he describes a proof of the Mahler-Manin conjecture that \[ J(q):= J(e^{2\pi i\tau}):= j(\tau) \] has transcendental values at algebraic arguments \(q= e^{2\pi i\tau}\), \(0<| q|< 1\), proved recently by \textit{K. Barré-Sirieix}, \textit{G. Diaz}, \textit{F. Gramain} and \textit{G. Philibert} [Invent. Math. 124, 1--9 (1996; Zbl 0853.11059)]. The second part treats results about algebraic independence of periods of elliptic curves and the values of modular forms and functions at the corresponding arguments in the upper half plane, beginning with the results of \textit{G. V. Chudnovsky} [Proc. Int. Cong. Math., Helsinki 1978, Vol. 1, 339--350 (1980; Zbl 0431.10019)]. It culminates with \textit{Yu. Nesterenko's} result [Sb. Math. 187, No. 9, 1319--1348 (1996); translation from Mat. Sb. 187, 65--96 (1996; Zbl 0898.11031)] that the transcendence degree of \(\mathbb{Q}(q,P(q),Q(q), R(q))\) is at least \(3\) if \(0<| q|<1\) and \(P\), \(Q\), \(R\) denote the Eisenstein series of weight \(2\), \(4\), \(6\) in Ramanujan's notation. Nestenko's theorem has many spectacular consequences, e.g. the algebraic independence of the three numbers \(\pi\), \(e^\pi\), \(\Gamma(1/4)\) or \(\pi\), \(e^{\pi\sqrt 3}\), \(\Gamma(1/3)\), several corollaries about values of theta functions, and the transcendence of the series \(\sum F^{-2}_n\) for the Fibonacci numbers \(F_n\). All these results have effective versions! Besides classical methods of transcendence, the main new ingredients are zero estimates established in the last years by Nesterenko, Philippon and Philibert. These are described in Section 3. Waldschmidt's survey ends with a rich commented bibliography (of 83 titles). Many conjectures spread all over the text show that transcendence has made remarkable progress but did not at all arrive at an end. For the entire collection see [Zbl 0910.00034].

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