The Norm Residue Theorem asserts that the following is true:
For an odd prime l, and a field k containing 1/l,
2) For n ≤ i, the motivic cohomology group Hn,i(X,Z/l) is isomorphic to the etale cohomology group Hn(X,μli).
The case l=2 is a theorem of Voevodsky, established in [MC/2].
The case n=1 is a well known part of Kummer theory.
The cases n=2 (and n=3, l=2) were established by 1990.
The equivalence of the two assertions is due to Suslin-Voevodsky
in characteristic 0, and is also true in characteristic p>0.
Status as of October 2006:
The 2003 preprint [MC/l] sketches a proof, modulo two missing lemmas
(2.2, 2.3).
The preprint also assumed that a construction of Rost in [R-CL] satisfied
certain properties.
These properties have since been verified in the
Suslin-Joukhovitsky paper [SJ].
Status as of January 2009: All the papers involved in the proof, including [MC/l], [V-cancel], [V-over] as well as [HW], [W-axioms] and [W-patch], have now been submitted for publication. Several of these have been refereed and accepted.
Status as of Summer 2010:
All of the papers involved in the proof have been accepted for publication.
Haesemeyer and I are writing up the entire proof in book form.
During the Fall semester of 2006, I gave a series of lectures at the
Institute for Advanced Study on
the status of the "Voevodsky-Rost Theorem,"
stated above. In the Spring semester, I gave a proof of this theorem.
Here is an outline of those lectures.
October 26: This was the first lecture. I started by describing the current status of the proof, which is described above. By a reduction in [MC/2], it suffices to start with a nonzero symbol a in KMn(k) and produce a splitting variety X of dimension d=ln-1 such that
By a known argument, a induces a nonzero element δ in Hn,n-1(χ,Z/l), where χ is a simplicial scheme formed from X. Applying a motivic cohomology operation to δ, we obtain an integral class μ in H2b+1,b(χ,Z), where b=(li-1)/(l-1).
The goal of the November lectures (which was achieved) will be to
prove that μ is nonzero when X is a splitting variety.
I also
showed how μ defined an element ρ of CHb(X×X).
Rost calls ρ the basic correspondence of X, and studies it
in [R-BC]. The power ρl-1 is an element of
CHd(X× X), i.e., a classical Chow correspondence from
X to itself.
Nov.2: I gave the following axiomatic presentation of the motivic operations Pi:
Nov.9: I constructed the cohomology operations Pi on
motivic cohomology with coefficients Z/l, l an odd prime.
The presentation was based upon [RPO].
First I observed that, if G is the symmetric group on l letters,
the motivic cohomology of BG is H[c,d], where d has bidegree (2l-2,l-1),
βc=d and H is the motivic cohomology of k.
There is a Künneth formula for the cohomology of X×BG.
Next, I constructed a functorial version of the map from CHe(X) to CHel(X × BG). Roughly speaking, if we replace X by the classifying space Ke of CHe then the image of the canonical element gives an element P of CHel(Ke × BG). By the Künneth formula, P is a polynomial in c,d and we define Pi to be the coefficient of de-i. The coefficient of cde-i is βPi+1.
Nov. 16:
Proved that the above construction produces a nonzero
integral class μ in H2b+1,b(χ,Z).
This is the black box input used by Rost in his basic correspondences paper
[R-BC].
The lecture
covered the contents of section 4 (except 4.4) and 6.5-6.7 of [MC/l].
The following construction was used to prove that the degree of
sd(X) is divisible by l, and to simplify the proof of 4.1.
For any d-dimensional projective X, there is a classical map Z(d)[2d] → M(X) in DM, or X→Spec k in the category of Chow motives, defined by the cycle (X×Spec k) in CH0(X×Spec k). (It generates the 2d-part of the rational Chow motive of X.) The composition of this map with a zero-cycle Z, thought of as a map M(X)→Z(d)[2d], gives the degree of Z.
Dec. 7: I gave the following set of axioms, and showed that they
imply the Bloch-Kato Conjecture.
Axioms: 0. M should be a direct summand of M(X), i.e., a Chow motive.
Thus there is a canonical map y: M → M(χ).
Dec. 14: Following Rost, I constructed a symmetric idempotent e of the
Chow motive of X, and defined M to be the Chow motive (X,e). Thus
Axioms 0 and 1 are automatically satisfied by M.
I don't know how to
verify Axiom 2. This material is due to Rost [R-BC].
We start with the element ρ of CHb(X×X),
constructed in the October 26 Lecture from the element μ.
We assume Rost's calculation that c=π*ρl-1
is not divisibly by l, where π is the projection X×X →X and
Theorem: There is an idempotant e in End(X)=CHd(X×X).
It is constructed in the ring CH*(X×X) as a polynomial in
ρ and in the π*π*ρj, l
< j.
To show this, we considered the special case
ρ=H×X-X×H when ce is the sum of the
Hi×Hj with i+j=l-1.
March 8, 2007: I introduced the notion of a proper Tate motive, which is a direct sum of Lefschetz motives La[b], b≥0 in the category of motives with coefficients mod l. This category is idempotent complete and (by Cancellation) the Künneth Formula holds for wedges of spaces whose motives are proper Tate motives.
I sketched a proof of Voevodsky's Theorem [V07] that the category of proper Tate motives is closed under symmetric products. A theorem of Suslin-Voevodsky [SV] implies that if K is the space representing H2n,n(-,Z) and n>0, then its motive is the infinite symmetric product of Ln. This proves that the Künneth Formula holds for wedges of copies of K. This is a slight modification of the missing Lemma 2.3 from [MC/l].
April 19, 2007: I finished the proof of the Bloch-Kato conjecture.
This material has since been written up in the preprint [W-patch]
The key new idea is the notion of scalar weight, based upon the action of Z/l on H**(K,Z/l), where K represents some Hp,q(-,Z). When (p,q)=(2n,n) this has an interpretation in terms of infinite symmetic products; terms from SsLn have scalar weight s, and its pure Tate summands La[b] satisfy:
Theorem:
Let φ be a cohomology operation of scalar weight one, from
H2n+1,n(X,Z) to H2nl+1,nl(X,Z/l).
If φ vanishes on suspension elements, then
φ is a multiple of βPn.
The primary application of this is to the cohomology operation constructed
in section 3 of [MC/l].
Now set M=Sl-1A, where A is the fiber
of μ:χ → χ(b)[2b+1].
By construction, φ is nonzero but vanishes on M. The above theorem
says that βPn also vanishes on M. This suffices for
Voevodsky's proof to go through, showing that the map
λ: M(X)→ M is a split surjection, and proving:
As we saw in the Dec.7 lecture, this establishes the Bloch-Kato conjecture.