Pethő, Attila

Schmitt, Susanne

Periodica Mathematica Hungarica

University of Debrecen Electronic Archive

Elements with bounded height in number fields
A. Petho˝∗, S Schmitt
November 28, 2009
Dedicated to Professor Andra´s Sa´rko¨zy on the occasion of his 60th birthday.
Abstract. We give a constructive proof of the fact that there exist only
finitely many elements with bounded height in number fields. This provides an
efficient method to enumerate all those elements. Such a method is helpful to
compute bases on elliptic curves.
Mathematics subject classification numbers, 11R33, 11G50, 14G05.
Key words and phrases, Algebraic number fields, integral bases, LLL-reduction,
absolute height, elliptic curves, Ne´ron-Tate height, Mordell-Weil basis of elliptic
curves.
1 Introduction
Let K be a number field of degree n = [K : Q] = s + 2t, where s denotes the
number of real and 2t the number of complex isomorphisms of K. Let MK be
the set of inequivalent absolute values in K. For an absolute value v let nv be
the local degree. The absolute height of the element x ∈ K is defined by
H(x) =
( ∏
v∈MK
max{1, |x|v}nv
)1/n
.
This measure is very convenient for theoretical purposes. It is well known (see
e.g. J. Silverman [8]) that for any A ∈ R, A ≥ 1, there exist only finitely many
x ∈ K with H(x) ≤ A.
In this article we fix a positive number A ∈ R, A ≥ 1, and consider the set
SA := {x ∈ K : H(x) ≤ A}.
Using Manin’s conditional algorithm [4] (for details see S. Schmitt [6]) to
compute a basis of an elliptic curve over K one gets a maximal set of linearly
independent points on the curve. The basis can then be computed using an
∗Research partially supported by Hungarian National Foundation for Scientific Research,
Grant No. T25157 and T16975
1
index estimate of S. Siksek [7]. For this estimate one has to check for a fixed A
all elements x ∈ SA whether there exists y ∈ K such that the point (x, y) is lying
on the curve. A similar problem arises in the 2-descent algorithm, where one
has to test equations of the form y2 = g(x), where g(x) is a quartic polynomial,
whether they have a solution (x, y) in K2 (cf e.g. [2], [9]). To solve such problems
one has to provide an efficient method to enumerate all elements of bounded
height.
In Section 3 we use the method of searching points of bounded height devel-
oped in the preceding sections to compute bases on elliptic curves over quadratic
number fields.
In the case K = Q every x ∈ Q can be written as x = a/b, with integers
a, b such that b > 0 and gcd(a, b) = 1. For elements of number fields we have
an analogous representation. For every x ∈ K there exist an algebraic integer
α ∈ ZK and a positive rational integer c such that x = α/c. Choosing an integral
basis ω1, . . . , ωn of ZK the element x ∈ K can be written as
x =
a1ω1 + · · ·+ anωn
c
with a1, . . . , an, c ∈ Z. These parameters are obviously not at all unique. For
x ∈ SA the size of a1, . . . , an, and c depends not only on A, but also on the
choice of the integral basis.
For x ∈ K denote by x(k) the conjugates of x, 1 ≤ k ≤ n. Adapting the
notation of M. Pohst [5] let
T2(x) =
n∑
k=1
|x(k)|2
for x ∈ K.
Theorem 1. Let A ∈ R, A ≥ 1. Further, let Ω = {ω1, . . . , ωn} be an integral
basis of ZK and DK the discriminant of K. Then any x ∈ SA can be represented
in the form
x =
a1ω1 + . . .+ anωn
c
with a1, . . . , an, c ∈ Z, satisfying
0 < c ≤ An
and
|ai| ≤ A
nc
√
n
|DK|1/2
∏
1≤j≤n
j 6=i
T2(ωj)1/2 =: Bi(K,Ω, A, c)
for i = 1, . . . , n.
In the present note we also prove that it is possible to choose the integral
basis ω1, . . . , ωn such that for x ∈ SA the bound for the size of a1, . . . , an and
c depends only on A and K. From the proof of Theorem 3 it will be clear that
2
ω1, . . . , ωn can be computed from an arbitrary integral basis by using the very
efficient LLL algorithm discovered by A.K. Lenstra, H.W. Lenstra Jr. and L.
Lova´sz [3]. More precisely we prove the following theorem.
Theorem 2. Let A ∈ R, A ≥ 1. Denote by 2t the number of non-real iso-
morphisms of K. There exists an integral basis ω1, . . . , ωn of ZK such that any
x ∈ SA can be represented in the form a1, . . . , an, c ∈ Z with the properties
x =
a1ω1 + · · ·+ anωn
c
with a1, . . . , an, c ∈ Z satisfying
0 < c ≤ An
and
|ai| ≤ 2n(n+1)/4−tAnc =: Bi(K, A, c)
for i = 1, . . . , n.
2 Proofs of Theorem 1 and Theorem 2
For the proof of the theorems we need some auxiliary results. To state them we
fix some notation.
Denote by MK,0 the set of discrete valuations of K. For a prime ideal p
let vp ∈ MK,0 be the non-archimedian absolute value corresponding to p and
np = nvp the corresponding local degree. The normalized additive absolute
value is then ordvp(x) with
|x|npvp = N (p)−ordvp (x).
For simplicity in the sequel we write ordp(x) instead of ordvp(x).
Lemma 1. Let x ∈ K such that H(x) ≤ A. Then there exist α ∈ ZK and c ∈ Z
such that x = αc and 0 < c ≤ An.
Proof. By the unique prime ideal decomposition theorem we can write the
fractional ideal (x) in the form
(x) = q1q−12 ,
where
q1 =
∏
p∈MK,0
ordp(x)>0
pordp(x) and q2 =
∏
p∈MK,0
ordp(x)<0
p−ordp(x).
Then q2 is an integral ideal. Denote its norm by c. Then c is a positive integer
and the principal ideal (c) is divisible by q2. There exists an integral ideal q3
such that (c) = q2q3. Hence
(x) = q1q3(c)−1,
3
which implies that q1q3 is a principal ideal, too. Denoting its generator by β
we obtain
(x) = (β)(c)−1,
which proves the first assertion of the lemma by taking α = βε for a suitable
unit ε.
Now we estimate the size of c. We have
c = N (q2) =
∏
p∈MK,0
ordp(x)<0
N (p)−ordp(x) =
∏
p∈MK,0
ordp(x)<0
|x|npvp ≤ H(x)n.
The lemma is proved.
Proof of Theorem 1. If H(x) ≤ A then by Lemma 1 there exist an algebraic
integer α ∈ ZK and a rational integer c ∈ Z, c > 0 such that x = α/c and
c ≤ An. The assumption H(x) ≤ A implies that for all v ∈MK
|x|v ≤ An/nv ≤ An,
hence
|α|v ≤ An|c|v.
If we consider archimedian absolute values, we see that for all conjugates of α
|α(k)| ≤ Anc.
Choose an integral basis ω1, . . . , ωn of ZK. Then α can be written in the form
α = a1ω1 + . . .+ anωn
with ai ∈ Z. Taking conjugates and using Cramer’s rule we see that
ai =
Di
D
1/2
K
,
where
Di = det

ω
(1)
1 . . . α
(1) . . . ω
(1)
n
· · ·
· · ·
· · ·
ω
(n)
1 . . . α
(n) . . . ω
(n)
n

is the determinant of the matrix (ω(k)j )1≤j,k≤n, where the i-th column is replaced
by the vector (α(k))1≤k≤n.
By means of the Hadamard inequality for Di the estimate
|Di| ≤
(
n∑
k=1
|α(k)|2
)1/2 ∏
1≤j≤n
j 6=i
(
n∑
k=1
|ω(k)j |2
)1/2
=
(
n∑
k=1
|α(k)|2
)1/2 ∏
1≤j≤n
j 6=i
T2(ωj)1/2
4
holds. The inequality
n∑
k=1
|α(k)|2 ≤
n∑
k=1
A2nc2 = A2nc2n
proves the theorem.
Recall that the number field K has s real and 2t non-real embeddings into
the field of complex numbers. Order the conjugate fields as usual so that
K(1), . . . ,K(s) denote the real and K(s+1), . . . ,K(s+t), K(s+1), . . . ,K(s+t) denote
the non-real conjugate fields of K.
M. Pohst [5] proved that there exists a Q-basis ρ1 = 1, ρ2, . . . , ρn of algebraic
integers in K such that
n∏
i=1
T2(ρi) ≤ γnn |DK|,
where γnn denotes the Minkowski constant. Unfortunately ρ1 = 1, ρ2, . . . , ρn is
usually not an integral basis, hence this result is not applicable in our situation.
Using ideas of J. Buchmann and A. Petho˝ [1] we are able to prove the existence
of an integral basis such that the product of the T2-norm of the basis elements
is small. Moreover the proof gives us an algorithm for the computation of such
a basis.
Theorem 3. Let K be of degree n = s + 2t and with discriminant DK. There
exists an integral basis ω1, . . . , ωn in K such that
n∏
i=1
T2(ωi) ≤ 2n(n+1)/2−2t|DK|.
Proof. ¿From the geometry of numbers it is well known that the mapping
φ : K → Rn
x 7→ x = (x(1), . . . , x(s),<x(s+1), . . . ,<x(s+t),=x(s+1), . . . ,=x(s+t))T
is a morphism of K and the image φ(ZK) is a complete lattice in Rn. We have
further
det(φ(ZK))2 = 2−2t|DK|.
The application of the LLL algorithm [3] to the lattice φ(ZK) leads to an integral
basis ω1, . . . , ωn with
n∏
i=1
|ωi| ≤ 2n(n−1)/4 det(φ(ZK)) = 2n(n−1)/4−t|DK|1/2,
where |ωi|2 =
s+t∑
j=1
|ω(j)i |2. Since
T2(ωi) =
n∑
j=1
|ω(j)i |2 ≤ 2|ωi|2
5
we may conclude
n∏
i=1
T2(ωi) ≤ 2n
n∏
i=1
|ωi|2 ≤ 2n(n+1)/2−2t|DK|.
Theorem 3 is proved.
We are now in the position to prove Theorem 2.
Proof of Theorem 2. If H(x) ≤ A then by Theorem 1 there exist integers
b1, . . . , bn, c ∈ Z, c > 0 such that
α = b1ω′1 + . . .+ bnω
′
n
x =
α
c
0 < c ≤ An
and
|bi| ≤ A
nc
√
n
|DK|1/2
∏
1≤j≤n
j 6=i
T2(ω′j)
1/2,
where ω′1, . . . , ω
′
n is an arbitrary integral basis of ZK. Now choose an integral
basis ω1, . . . , ωn of ZK, which existence was proved in Theorem 2 and write α
in the form
α = a1ω1 + . . .+ anωn.
As the ωi’s are non-zero algebraic integers the absolute values of their norms are
at least 1. The inequality between the arithmetic and geometric mean implies
T2(ωi) ≥ n, i = 1, . . . , n.
Therefore ∏
1≤j≤n
j 6=i
T2(ωj)1/2 ≤ 1√
n
∏
1≤j≤n
T2(ωj)1/2.
By Theorem 3 we obtain∏
1≤j≤n
T2(ωj) ≤ 2n(n+1)/2−2t|DK|.
Hence for i = 1, . . . , n
|ai| ≤ A
nc
√
n
|DK|1/2 ·
1√
n
· 2n(n+1)/4−t|DK|1/2 = 2n(n+1)/4−tAnc
as required. The theorem is proved.
6
3 Examples
The computations in this section were performed using the computer algebra
system SIMATH (see [10]).
In their article [2], J. Cremona and P. Serf use descent methods to compute
the rank of elliptic curves over real quadratic number fields with class number
one. They give 8 examples of elliptic curves, where they also find a maximal set
of linearly independent points.
We now compute a basis for those elliptic curves from the examples which
have rank > 0. Therefore we estimate the index of the group generated by the
points found in [2]. Such an estimate is given in the following theorem of S.
Siksek.
Theorem 4. Let E be an elliptic curve of rank r > 0 over the number field K.
Let
0 < λ ≤ inf{hˆ(P ) : P ∈ E(K)\E(K)tors}
be an estimate for the minimal Ne´ron–Tate height of non torsion points. Further
let P1, . . . , Pr be linearly independent points on E(K). Then the index n of the
subgroup generated by P1, . . . , Pr in E(K) satisfies
n ≤ R1/2P1,...,Pr
(γr
λ
)r/2
.
Here RP1,...,Pr is the regulator of the points P1, . . . , Pr and γ
r
r are the Minkowski
constants, i.e.
γ11 = 1, γ
2
2 =
4
3 , γ
3
3 = 2, γ
4
4 = 4,
γ55 = 8, γ
6
6 =
64
3 , γ
7
7 = 64, γ
8
8 = 2
8
and for r ≥ 9 one has
γr =
4
pi
Γ
(r
2
+ 1
)2/r
.
Proof. See the article of Siksek [7].
To use this theorem we have to compute an estimate for the minimal Ne´ron-
Tate height of non torsion points. This is done in the following way. Choose
ε > 0 and find all points in the set
Tε := {P ∈ E(K)\E(K)tors : hˆ(P ) < ε}.
Then take
λ :=
{
min{hˆ(P ) : P ∈ Tε} if Tε 6= ∅
ε if Tε = ∅.
For computing the set Tε we need the difference between the Ne´ron-Tate height
and the Weil height on elliptic curves
h(P )− hˆ(P ) ≤ δ for a δ ∈ R, δ ≥ 0.
7
In his article [7], Siksek also gives an algorithm to compute an estimate for δ.
We compute this estimate for the examples. Then we find the points
{P ∈ E(K) : h(P ) < ε+ δ}.
This is the same as finding all elements in
SA := {x ∈ K : H(x) < exp(ε+ δ) =: A}.
For every element of SA we test if it corresponds to a point on E and if this
point is in the set Tε. Then we get the estimate λ.
Each element of the quadratic number field is denoted by an ordered pair
of integers which are its coefficients with respect to the standard integral basis.
The curves are defined as E = [a1, a2, a3, a4, a6] where the ai are the coefficients
of the Weierstraß normal form. We only consider those elliptic curves from [2]
where the rank is > 0.
Example 1: K = Q(
√
5), E = [(2, 0), (−2, 0), (−1,−1), (0, 1), (0,−1)]
Rank: r = rk(E(K)) = 2
Linearly independent points found in [2]:
Point Ne´ron-Tate height
P1 = ((0, 0), (1, 0)) 0.2117441002
P2 = ((8,−5), (−33, 21)) 1.2698716559
Regulator: RP1,P2 = 0.0807304562
δ ε A λ index
0 0.2 1.2214027582 0.2 ≤ 1.6404314085
We find no point with Ne´ron-Tate height ≤ ε, hence we can take λ = 0.2.
As the index of the group generated by P1, P2 is < 2, these points form a basis
of E(K).
Example 2: K = Q(
√
5), E = [(−2, 0), (−2,−1), (2,−2), (−2, 1), (0, 0)]
Rank: r = rk(E(K)) = 3
Linearly independent points found in [2]:
Point Ne´ron-Tate height
P1 = (1/4(−2, 3), 1/8(3, 4)) 2.0288667203
P2 = ((−1, 1), (−4, 3)) 0.3580740908
P3 = ((37,−23), (−228, 141)) 1.8363230414
Regulator: RP1,P2,P3 = 0.1057930442
δ ε A λ index
0.4497421983 0.4 2.3390437647 0.3580740908 ≤ 2.1467635270
We find two points with Ne´ron-Tate height ≤ ε: ±P2.
8
The results in the article [2] are computed using 2-descent. Therefore the
index of the group generated by the given points is not divisible by 2. From this
fact and the estimate for the index we see that P1, P2, P3 form a basis of E(K).
Example 3: K = Q(
√
2), E = [(0, 0), (2, 1), (0, 0), (1, 0), (−1,−1)]
Rank: r = rk(E(K)) = 1
Linearly independent points found in [2]:
Point Ne´ron-Tate height
P1 = ((0,−1), (1,−1)) 0.6661477648
Regulator: RP1 = 0.6661477648
δ ε A λ index
0.5333320118 0.6 3.1059884677 0.0740164183 ≤ 3.0000000002
We find four points with Ne´ron-Tate height ≤ ε:
Point Ne´ron-Tate height
Q1 = ((1, 1), (−3,−2)) 0.2960656732
−Q1 = ((1, 1), (3, 2)) 0.2960656732
Q2 = ((−1,−1), (−1, 0)) 0.0740164183
−Q2 = ((−1,−1), (1, 0)) 0.0740164183
¿From the estimate for the index and the fact that the index has to be odd,
we see that we have to test if the index is divisible by 3. It is easy to check that
3Q2 = P1 and (−2)Q2 = Q1,
so the index of the group generated by P1 in E(K) is equal to 3. A basis of
E(K) is given by Q2.
Example 4: K = Q(
√
13), E = [(0, 2), (0,−1), (1, 2), (0, 1), (0, 1)]
Rank: r = rk(E(K)) = 1
Linearly independent points found in [2]:
Point Ne´ron-Tate height
P1 = (1/4(−3, 0), 1/8(−3,−2)) 2.1920662705
Regulator: RP1 = 2.1920662705
δ ε A λ index
0.2090249966 0.3 1.6636683217 0.0876826508 ≤ 5.0000000006
We find two points with Ne´ron-Tate height ≤ ε:
Point Ne´ron-Tate height
Q1 = ((−1, 1), (−2, 1)) 0.0876826508
−Q1 = ((−1, 1), (−5,−3)) 0.0876826508
¿From the estimate for the index we see that we have to test if the index is
9
divisible by 3 and by 5. It is easy to check that
5Q1 = P1,
so the index is divisible by 5 and we get the basis Q1 of E(K).
Example 5: K = Q(
√
3), E = [(2, 2), (1, 1), (0, 0), (0, 2), (−2,−2)]
Rank: r = rk(E(K)) = 2
Linearly independent points found in [2]:
Point Ne´ron-Tate height
P1 = ((−2,−1), (10, 5)) 1.2626912790
P2 = (1/121(1756,−1405), 1/1331(169325,−77612)) 5.1558657383
Regulator: RP1,P2 = 1.3558456945
δ ε A λ index
0.0486645137 1 2.8538373114 1 ≤ 1.3445423977
We find no point with Ne´ron-Tate height ≤ ε, hence we can take λ = 1. As
the index of the group generated by P1, P2 is < 2, these points form a basis of
E(K).
In the examples we have not found any points with Ne´ron-Tate height equal
to 0. Hence we have proven that these curves have no torsion points.
Acknowledgment. We are grateful to D. Simon and J. Cremona for their
interesting comments with regard to this paper, especially for pointing out some
simplifications in the examples.
References
[1] J. Buchmann and A. Petho˝, Computation of Independent Units in Num-
ber Fields by Dirichlet’s Method, Math. Comput. 52 (1989), 149-159 and
S1-S14.
[2] J. Cremona and P. Serf, Computing the rank of elliptic curves over real
quadratic number fields of class number 1, Math. Comput. 68 (1999), 1187-
1200.
[3] A.K. Lenstra, H.W. Lenstra Jr. and L. Lova´sz, Factoring polyno-
mials with rational coefficients, Math. Ann. 261 (1982), 515-534.
[4] Yu.I. Manin, Cyclotomic fields and modular curves, Russian Math. Sur-
veys 26 (1971), 7-78.
[5] M. Pohst, On the computation of number fields of small discriminants in-
cluding the minimum discriminants of sixth degree fields, J. Number The-
ory, 14 (1982), 99–117.
[6] S. Schmitt, Bestimmung der Mordell-Weil Gruppe elliptischer Kurven
u¨ber algebraischen Zahlko¨rpern. Thesis, Univ. des Saarlandes, 1999.
10
[7] S. Siksek, Infinite Descent on Elliptic Curves, Rocky Mountain J. Math.
25 (1995), 1501-1538.
[8] J. Silverman, The Arithmetic of Elliptic Curves. Graduate Texts in
Math., Vol. 106, Springer Verlag, Berlin 1986.
[9] D. Simon, Computing the rank of elliptic curves over number fields, LMS
J. Comput. Math., to appear.
[10] SIMATH, A computer algebra system for algorithmic number theory,
http://simath.math.uni-sb.de.
A. Petho˝ S. Schmitt
Institute of Mathematics and Informatics FB Mathematik
University of Debrecen Universita¨t des Saarlandes
P.O. Box 12 Postfach 151150
4010 Debrecen 66041 Saarbru¨cken
Hungary Germany
email: pethoe@math.klte.hu email: susanne@math.uni-sb.de
11


Elements with bounded height in number fields

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