Selectivity in Quaternion Algebras

TL;DR

This paper establishes criteria for embedding quadratic orders into quaternion orders over number fields, extending classical theorems to integral settings and explicitly characterizing when embeddings exist.

Contribution

It provides necessary and sufficient conditions for embeddings of quadratic orders into quaternion orders, including explicit parametrizations and proportion calculations.

Findings

Criteria for embeddings in the genus of quaternion orders

Explicit parametrization of embedding classes

Proportion of orders admitting embeddings is 0, 1/2, or 1

Abstract

We prove an integral version of the classical Albert-Brauer-Hasse-Noether theorem regarding quaternion algebras over number fields. Let $\mathfrak A$ be a quaternion algebra over a number field $K$ and assume that $\mathfrak A$ satisfies the Eichler condition; that is, there exists an archimedean prime of $K$ which does not ramify in $\mathfrak A$. Let $\Omega$ be a commutative, quadratic $\mathcal{O}_K$-order and let $\mathcal{R}\subset \mathfrak A$ be an order of full rank. Assume that there exists an embedding of $\Omega$ into $\mathcal R$. We describe a number of criteria which, if satisfied, imply that every order in the genus of $\mathcal R$ admits an embedding of $\Omega$. In the case that the relative discriminant ideal of $\Omega$ is coprime to the level of $\mathcal R$ and the level of $\mathcal R$ is coprime to the discriminant of $\mathfrak A$, we give necessary and sufficient conditions for an order in the genus of $\mathcal R$ to admit an embedding of $\Omega$. We explicitly parameterize the isomorphism classes of orders in the genus of $\mathcal R$ which admit an embedding of $\Omega$. In particular, we show that the proportion of the genus of $\mathcal{R}$ admitting an embedding of $\Omega$ is either 0, 1/2 or 1. Analogous statements are proven for optimal embeddings.