Elliptic Wieferich primes (Q1976803)

A prime number \(p\) such that \(a^{p-1}\equiv 1\pmod{p^2-1}\) is called a base-\(a\) Wieferich prime, when \(a=2\) one says plainly that \(p\) is a Wieferich prime. The origin of its interest, now mainly historical, is a theorem by Wieferich in which it was asserted that the first case of Fermat's Last Theorem holds if \(p\) is not a Wieferich prime. However they do appear again in other contexts, when considering the analogy between the arithmetic of function fields and number fields [cf. \textit{A. Buium}, Duke Math. J. 82, 349--367 (1996; Zbl 0882.14007), \textit{Y. Ihara}, On Fermat quotient and ``differentiation of numbers'', RIMS Kokyuroku 810, 324--341 (in Japanese) (1992), English translation by S. Hahn (preprint), \textit{A. L. Smirnov}, St. Petersbg. Math. J. 4, 357--375 (1993; Zbl 0814.11056)]. There are open questions on the distribution of Wieferich primes such as it is not known for any given base \(a\) whether there exist infinitely many non-Wieferich primes to the base \(a\). However, \textit{J. Silverman} [J. Number Theory 30, 226-237 (1988; Zbl 0654.10019)] has shown that this follows from the \(abc\) conjecture. There is also an unconditional result due to \textit{A. Granville}, Int. Math. Res. Notes 1998, No.~19, 991--1009 (1998; Zbl 0924.11018)] which asserts that if \(a\) is a prime and \(a^{p-1}\equiv 1\pmod{p^2-1}\) for sufficiently large primes \(p\), then \(a^{p-1}\equiv 1\pmod{p^3-1}\) for infinitely many primes \(p\). If we replace the multiplicative group by the additive group of points of an elliptic curve over a global field a similar notion of elliptic Wieferich primes is defined. The purpose of the paper is to investigate further these elliptic Wieferich primes proving an analogue of Granville's result in the number field case, as well as more precise results in the function field set-up. The results of Silverman are also discussed. More precisely, given a global field \(K\) and a non-archimedian place \(v\) of \(K\) of norm \(q_v\), \(a\in K\) with \(v(a)=0\), then \(v(a^{q_v-1}-1)\geq 1\). If the inequality is strict, \(v\) is called a Wieferich place to the base \(a\). Similarly, if \(E/K\) is an elliptic curve, \(P\in E(K)\) and suppose that \(E\) has good reduction at \(v\). Let \(N_v\) be the number of rational points of the reduction of \(E\) modulo \(v\). Then \(N_vP\in\hat{E}\), where \(\hat{E}\) is the formal group of \(E\) which admits a filtration \(\hat{E}=E_1\supset E_2\supset\cdots\), where \(E_m=\{Q\in E(K_v) |v(t(Q))\geq m\}\) and \(t\) is a local parameter at the origin of \(E\). The place \(v\) is called an elliptic Wieferich place for the base \(P\) if \(N_vP\in E_2\). It is a strong Wieferich place to the base \(P\) if \(n_vP\in E_2\), where \(n_v\) is the order of \(P\) modulo \(v\). The first result is done for \(K\) a number field. If \(a\in K^*\) is not a root of unity, \(v(a^{q_v-1}-1)\geq 2\) for all but finitely many places of \(K\), then \(v(a^{q_v-1}-1)\geq 3\) for infinitely many places of \(K\). For elliptic curves, if \(n_vP\in E_2\) for all but finitely many places \(v\) of \(K\) satisfying \((n_v,q_v)=1\), then \(n_vP\in E_3\) for infinitely many places of \(K\) satisfying \((n_v,q_v)=1\). In the case where \(K\) is a function field of characteristic \(p\), \(P\in E(K)\), but \(P\notin pE(K_s)\), where \(K_s\) denotes the separable closure of \(K\), then there are infinitely many strong elliptic Wieferich places to the base \(P\) with \(p\) not dividing \(n_v\).