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10 votes
3 answers
2k views

Is $Sym^n (V^*) \cong Sym^n (V)^\ast$ naturally in positive characteristic?

Background/motivation It is a classical fact that we have a natural isomorphism $Sym^n (V^*) \cong Sym^n (V) ^\ast$ for vector spaces $V$ over a field $k$ of characteristic 0. One way to see this is ...
Andrea Ferretti's user avatar
0 votes
3 answers
818 views

How do we construct (in a vector space) a chain of countable dimensional subspaces that can only be bounded by an subspace of uncountable dimension?

In more rigorous language: " V: a vector space having an uncountable base S: The set of subspaces of V that have countable dimension. Can we construct explicitly a chain in the poset S (ordered by ...
QuackQuack's user avatar
25 votes
3 answers
2k views

product of all F_p, p prime

Let $R$ be the ring $$R = \prod_{p\ \text{prime}} \mathbb{F}_p$$ where $\mathbb{F}_p$ is the field having $p$ elements. Is it true that $R$ has a quotient by a maximal ideal which is a field of ...
Wanderer's user avatar
  • 5,163
25 votes
8 answers
15k views

Linear Algebra Problems?

Is there any good reference for difficult problems in linear algebra? Because I keep running into easily stated linear algebra problems that I feel I should be able to solve, but don't see any obvious ...
27 votes
4 answers
3k views

Have people successfully worked with the full ring of differential operators in characteristic p?

This question is inspired by an earlier one about the possibility of using the full ring of differential operators on a flag variety to develop a theory of localization in characteristic $p$. (Here ...
Emerton's user avatar
  • 57.6k
13 votes
0 answers
943 views

Beilinson-Bernstein localization in positive characteristic

This is a follow-up to this question; in particular, I'm wondering if anyone can expand upon the interesting answers given by Kevin McGerty and David Ben-Zvi there. (In particular, in this question I'...
Chuck Hague's user avatar
  • 3,637
0 votes
2 answers
253 views

Corruption and Recovery

Suppose we want to recover an input vector $f \in \textbf{R}^n$ from some measurements $y = Af + \varepsilon$. Now $A$ is an $m \times n$ matrix and $\varepsilon$ are some unknown errors. Is this ...
Rob Doty's user avatar
34 votes
2 answers
3k views

The work of E. Artin and F. K. Schmidt on (what are now called) the Weil conjectures.

I was reading Dieudonne's "On the history of the Weil conjectures" and found two things that surprised me. Dieudonne makes some assertions about the work of Artin and Schmidt which are no doubt ...
Kevin Buzzard's user avatar
7 votes
3 answers
3k views

congruent to 1 mod p

This is a somewhat vague question: for a prime number p, we often see that various counts come out to be 1 modulo p. What are the possible reasons for this? Here are some I've encountered: For some ...
15 votes
2 answers
814 views

Can the failure of the multiplicativity of Euler factors at bad primes be corrected?

Warning: This one of those does-anyone-know-how-to-fix-this-vague-problem questions, and not an actual mathematics question at all. If $X$ is a scheme of finite type over a finite field, then the ...
JBorger's user avatar
  • 9,418
0 votes
2 answers
4k views

Convergence of iterative algorithm.

For quite a long time I'm trying to prove convergence of an iterative algorithm in case of a particular system of nonlinear equations. Here are some characteristics of this system: It consists of n ...
Tomek Tarczynski's user avatar
2 votes
6 answers
5k views

Finding the Square-Root of a Non-diagonalizable Positive Matrix

What methods exist for finding the square-root of a non-diagonalizabe positive complex matrix?
Abtan Massini's user avatar
24 votes
5 answers
6k views

Wild Ramification

The question is, loosely put, what is known about wild ramification? Is there a semi-well-established theory of wild ramification that can be furthered in various specific situations? Or maybe there ...
368 votes
31 answers
80k views

Geometric interpretation of trace

This afternoon I was speaking with some graduate students in the department and we came to the following quandary; Is there a geometric interpretation of the trace of a matrix? This question ...
6 votes
0 answers
456 views

On periods of algebraic integers modulo rational primes

I run, somewhat indirectly, into the following problem and I have no hints where to look in the literature in search for answers or clues. Let $K$ be a number field, which we may assume Galois if it ...
Andrea Mori's user avatar
6 votes
1 answer
887 views

Linear algebra lemma

The following Lemma is in Beauville-Donagi, and I always took it for granted. Now I've tried to find a proof, but got stuck. They say it is a really simple lemma, so I may just be overlooking ...
Andrea Ferretti's user avatar
2 votes
3 answers
657 views

Are the Gell-Mann matrices extremal when used as Kraus operators for a quantum channel?

Landau and Streater proved that a set of Kraus operators, Ai, is extremal if and only if the set $\{A_{k}^{\dagger}A_{l}\}_{k,l \ldots N}$ are linearly independent. I have seen very convincing ...
sep332's user avatar
  • 121
6 votes
1 answer
347 views

Sparse approximate representation of a collection of vectors

Suppose I have a collection of $n$ vectors $C \subset \mathbb{F}_2^n$. They are of course spanned by the canonical set of $n$ basis vectors. What I would like to find is a much smaller (~ $\log n$) ...
Donald's user avatar
  • 583
2 votes
1 answer
148 views

an exercise on integrality of characteristic polynomials

Suppose A is a matrix with coefficient in $Q_{\ell}$, and all the coefficients of its char. polynomial are in $Z$ (thus an integral polynomial). Prove that the char. polynomial of $A^n$ is also ...
natura's user avatar
  • 1,503
127 votes
4 answers
32k views

Slick proof?: A vector space has the same dimension as its dual if and only if it is finite dimensional

A very important theorem in linear algebra that is rarely taught is: A vector space has the same dimension as its dual if and only if it is finite dimensional. I have seen a total of one proof of ...
7 votes
1 answer
728 views

Reference for Tate vector spaces

... aka locally linear compact vector spaces. The one reference I know is http://www.math.harvard.edu/~gaitsgde/grad_2009/SeminarNotes/Nov3-10(CentExt).pdf. Does anyone know another good reference?
Dinakar Muthiah's user avatar
3 votes
2 answers
2k views

Solving a noisy set of linear equations.

Suppose we have a square $n\times n$ real matrix $A$ of full rank such that the squares of the elements in each row sum to 1, an $n\times 1$ vector of variables $x$, and an $n\times 1$ real vector $a$,...
Jimmy's user avatar
  • 41
15 votes
1 answer
4k views

Frobenius Descent

Let $S$ be a scheme of positive characteristic $p$ and $X$ a smooth $S$-scheme. Let $F:X\rightarrow X^{(p)}$ denote the relative Frobenius. A result by Cartier (often called Cartier descent or ...
Lars's user avatar
  • 4,450
2 votes
2 answers
1k views

What is it called if a vector space doesn't have an additive inverse?

so, you have, for any two members of the algebraic structure A and B and any nonnegative real values a, b: two operations: * and +, such that a*A + b*A = (a+b)*A is in the structure A + B = B + A ...
Neil's user avatar
  • 598
14 votes
3 answers
2k views

Representations in characteristic p

Let G be a finite group and let F be an algebraically closed field. If the characteristic of F is 0, then the number of irreducible F-representations of G is given by the number of conjugacy classes ...
Joel Dodge's user avatar
  • 2,799
9 votes
2 answers
2k views

A generalization of Boolean matrix multiplication for order-3 tensors

The Boolean matrix product of two 0-1 $n \times n$ matrices $A$ and $B$ is the matrix $C$ defined as $$C[i,j] = \vee_{k=1}^n (A[i,k] \wedge B[k,j]).$$ If $A = B$ and the matrix is an adjacency matrix ...
Ryan Williams's user avatar
15 votes
5 answers
18k views

Proving "almost all matrices over C are diagonalizable".

This is an elementary question, but a little subtle so I hope it is suitable for MO. Let $T$ be an $n \times n$ square matrix over $\mathbb{C}$. The characteristic polynomial $T - \lambda I$ splits ...
Anweshi's user avatar
  • 7,442
17 votes
2 answers
3k views

Why is one interested in the mod p reduction of modular curves and Shimura varieties?

Why is one interested in the mod p reduction of modular curves and Shimura varieties? From an article I learned that this can be used to prove the Eichler-Shimura relation which in turn proves the ...
user avatar
3 votes
3 answers
212 views

Rank(A) and other algorithms as a polynomial

If $A = (\alpha_{ij}) \in \mathbb{C}^{nxm}$ we have simple algorithms by which to determine $\mathrm{rank}(A)$. However, is there a polynomial $f \in \mathbb{C}[\alpha_{ij}]$ where $f \colon \mathbb{C}...
Mark Bell's user avatar
  • 3,165
2 votes
2 answers
3k views

Statement of Lagrange's theorem on determinants(elementary question).

Apologies for this elementary question; but I was unable to find a reference otherwise. Let $A, B, C$ be square matrices of the same dimension. Then, $$\begin{vmatrix} A & C \\\ 0 & B \end{...
Anweshi's user avatar
  • 7,442
16 votes
3 answers
2k views

On Category O in positive characteristic

Let $G$ be a semisimple algebraic group over an algebraically closed field $k$. In the case that $k$ has characteristic 0, there has been intensive study of the BGG category O of representations of ...
Chuck Hague's user avatar
  • 3,637
4 votes
1 answer
412 views

F_q-structures on schemes

Let $k|\mathbb{F}_q$ be a field extension. An $\mathbb{F}_q$-structure on a $k$-algebra $A$ is an $\mathbb{F}_q$-subalgebra $A _0$ of $A$ such that $A _0 \otimes _{\mathbb{F}_q} k \cong A$ via the ...
user717's user avatar
  • 5,243
38 votes
1 answer
10k views

Infinite tensor products

Let $A$ be a commutative ring and $M_i, i \in I$ be a infinite family of $A$-modules. Define their tensor product $\bigotimes_{i \in I} M_i$ to be a representing object of the functor of multilinear ...
Martin Brandenburg's user avatar
21 votes
5 answers
5k views

Mirror symmetry mod p?! ... Physics mod p?!

In his answer to this question, Scott Carnahan mentions "mirror symmetry mod p". What is that? (Some kind of) Gromov-Witten invariants can be defined for varieties over fields other than $\mathbb{C}$...
Kevin H. Lin's user avatar
13 votes
8 answers
38k views

What is the difference between matrix theory and linear algebra? [closed]

Hi, Currently, I'm taking matrix theory, and our textbook is Strang's Linear Algebra. Besides matrix theory, which all engineers must take, there exists linear algebra I and II for math majors. What ...
kolistivra's user avatar
47 votes
2 answers
9k views

current status of crystalline cohomology?

The great references given on Ilya's question make me wonder about the current status of the many conjectures and open questions in Illusie's survey from 1994 on crystalline cohomology. Obviously (...
9 votes
1 answer
566 views

algorithm for calculating the Chow groups of a variety over a finite field

Is there an algorithm for calculating the Chow groups of a variety over a finite field? It is know that $H^{2i,i}_\mathrm{mot}(X,\mathbf{Z}) = CH^i(X)$. In how many cases does this help us?
user avatar
9 votes
2 answers
656 views

How does the order of a pole of a zeta function indicate any geometric information?

Here, I'm primarily concerced about zeta functions of hypersurfaces over fields of finite characteristic. Assume $F_q$ to be a finite field with q elements. Consider the zeta function of the ...
Yinbang Lin's user avatar
1 vote
2 answers
879 views

Matrix logarithms are not unique

In my ODE class, we proved that if $\exp(L) = \exp(L')$ then the eigenvalues are congruent mod $2 \pi i$. Here, $L$ and $L'$ are two $n \times n$ matrices. I wanted to know if something more precise ...
john mangual's user avatar
  • 22.8k
1 vote
1 answer
419 views

Is the direction of the longest line of a polytope unique?

The question pertains to a polytope that is generated by the intersection of an affine subspace with a hypercube in $p$ dimensions. The affine subspace is given by: $X \mbox{ u} = y$ where $u$ &...
some_random_guy's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
354 views

On permutation of elements of two bases of a vector space (Greub´s book)

Let {a1,a2,...,an} and {b1,b2,...,bn} be two bases for a vector space E. Fix p, 1 ≤ p ≤n. Is there a permutation σ such that {a1,a2,...,ap,bσ(p+1),...,bσ(n)} and {bσ(1),...
Julio Cesar da Silva's user avatar
3 votes
1 answer
2k views

Conditions that allow unique solutions for Linear Diophantine equations

(This posting became very long, so I should note that there are two alternative but nearly equivalent formulations of the same question being given. The first one asks for the optimal strategy for ...
3 votes
1 answer
456 views

Standard name for basis-independent submatrices?

Given a linear map $T:H\to H$ on an inner-product space $H$ and a subspace $K\subseteq H$, define the map $T_K = \pi_K T \pi_K^* :K \to K$, where $\pi_K:H\to K$ is the orthogonal projection. As an ...
Mark Meckes's user avatar
  • 11.4k
11 votes
1 answer
2k views

Are automorphism groups of hypersurfaces reduced ?

In the following article : "H. Matsumura, P. Monsky, On the automorphisms of hypersurfaces, J. Math. Kyoto Univ. 3 (1964) 347-361", it is shown that in finite characteristic, automorphism groups of ...
Olivier Benoist's user avatar
8 votes
1 answer
1k views

obstruction to smooth lifting of smooth schemes

According to general theory, for a square zero thickening defined by an ideal I: SpecA -> SpecA', there is an obstruction of lifting a smooth scheme X over A to a smooth scheme over A' living in H^2(X,...
Yuhao Huang's user avatar
  • 5,052
5 votes
1 answer
2k views

Self-similar matrices? [closed]

Does anyone know anything about self-similar (infinite) matrices, with more or less fractal(-like) structure and admitting meaningful matrix-algebra operations?
Igor Korepanov's user avatar
4 votes
2 answers
818 views

Number of independent distances between n points in d-dimensional Euclidean space?

There are $\binom{n}{2}$ distances between $n$ points in $\mathbb{R}^d$. Not all of them can be chosen freely if $n$ exceeds the number $n_d = d + 1$. If $n = n_d$ we obviously have $\binom{d+1}{2}$ ...
Hans-Peter Stricker's user avatar
1 vote
0 answers
393 views

iterated characteristic polynomials

If I have $N$ $M\times M$ symmetric positive definite matrices $A_i$ and an $N\times N$ positive semi-definite symmetric matrix B, let the $N\times N$ matrix $C_{ij}(\lambda)=B_{ij}$ for $i\ne j$ and $...
mifune's user avatar
  • 11
3 votes
4 answers
2k views

How many parameters are needed to specify a k-dimensional subspace of R^d?

What is the number $N^d_k$ of real-valued parameters that are needed to specify a k-dimensional subspace of $\mathbb{R}^d$? And how can these parameters be interpreted? I know: $N^d_1 = N^d_{n-1} = d ...
Hans-Peter Stricker's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
210 views

Extracting integer multiplicative factors from the sum of certain sets of (finite-precision) real numbers?

Update based on Michael's answer (thanks again!) - Can the LLL or PSLQ algorithms provide a (knowably - i.e. not just incidental) unique solution for the set of integer multiplicative factors? Are ...
Richard's user avatar
  • 43