L-FUNCTIONS Contents Introduction 1 1. Algebraic Number Theory 3 2
L-FUNCTIONS ALEKSANDER HORAWA Contents Introduction1 1. Algebraic Number Theory3 2. Hecke L-functions 10 3. Tate's Thesis: Fourier Analysis in Number Fields and Hecke's Zeta Functions 13 4. Class Field Theory 52 5. Artin L-functions 55 References 79 Introduction These notes, meant as an introduction to the theory of L-functions, form a report from the author's Undergraduate Research Opportunities project at Imperial College London under the supervision of Professor David Helm. The theory of L-functions provides a way to study arithmetic properties of integers (and, more generally, integers of number fields) by first, translating them to analytic properties of certain functions, and then, using the tools and methods of analysis, to study them in this setting. The first indication that the properties of primes could be studied analytically came from Euler, who noticed the factorization (for a real number s > 1): 1 X 1 Y 1 = : ns 1 − p−s n=1 p prime This was later formalized by Riemann, who defined the ζ-function by 1 X 1 ζ(s) = ns n=1 for a complex number s with Re(s) > 1 and proved that it admits an analytic continuation by means of a functional equation. Riemann established a connection between its zeroes and the distribution of prime numbers, and it was also proven that the Prime Number Theorem 1 2 ALEKSANDER HORAWA is equivalent to the fact that no zeroes of ζ lie on the line Re(s) = 1. Innocuous as it may seem, this function is very difficult to study (the Riemann Hypothesis, asserting that the 1 non-trivial zeroes of ζ lie on the line Re(s) = 2 , still remains one of the biggest open problems in mathematics).
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