The Hasse-Witt invariant in some towers of function fields over finite fields (Q611930)

Let \(F\) be a function field with constant field \(\bar{\mathbb{F}}_q\) of characteristic \(p\), the algebraic closure of \(\mathbb{F}_q\). The \(p\)-rank \(\gamma(F)\) of \(F\) is the dimension over \(\mathbb{F}_p\) of the group of divisor classes of degree zero of order \(p\). The authors study the behavior of \(p\)-rank under extensions of \(F\). One of the main results of the paper is computing of the \(p\)-rank for a specific good tower over a cubic finite field \(\mathbb{F}_{q^3}\) introduced by \textit{A. Bassa, A. Garcia} and \textit{H. Stichtenoth} [Mosc. Math. J. 8, No. 3, 401--418 (2008; Zbl 1156.11045)]. The obtained results may be also useful for applications in coding theory.