Iterating additive polynomials over finite fields

TL;DR

This paper extends the understanding of the growth of the degree of splitting fields of iterated polynomials over finite fields, especially for additive and affine polynomials, revealing a step-function pattern and applications to dynamical systems.

Contribution

It generalizes Odoni's results to affine polynomials, showing their splitting field degrees grow like a step function, and provides new insights into polynomial iteration dynamics over finite fields.

Findings

Growth of splitting fields is at least linear unless special form

Additive polynomials exhibit step-function growth in splitting field degree

Applications include statistics of periodic points and polynomial factorization

Abstract

Let $q$ be a power of a prime $p$, let $\mathbb F_q$ be the finite field with $q$ elements and, for each nonconstant polynomial $F\in \mathbb F_{q}[X]$ and each integer $n\ge 1$, let $s_F(n)$ be the degree of the splitting field (over $\mathbb F_q$) of the iterated polynomial $F^{(n)}(X)$. In 1999, Odoni proved that $s_A(n)$ grows linearly with respect to $n$ if $A\in \mathbb F_q[X]$ is an additive polynomial not of the form $aX^{p^h}$; moreover, if $q=p$ and $B(X)=X^p-X$, he obtained the formula $s_{B}(n)=p^{\lceil \log_p n\rceil}$. In this paper we note that $s_F(n)$ grows at least linearly unless $F\in \mathbb F_q[X]$ has an exceptional form and we obtain a stronger form of Odoni's result, extending it to affine polynomials. In particular, we prove that if $A$ is additive, then $s_A(n)$ resembles the step function $p^{\lceil \log_p n\rceil}$ and we indeed have the identity $s_A(n)=\alpha p^{\lceil \log_p \beta n\rceil}$ for some $\alpha, \beta\in \mathbb Q$, unless $A$ presents a special irregularity of dynamical flavour. As applications of our main result, we obtain statistics for periodic points of linear maps over $\mathbb F_{q^i}$ as $i\to +\infty$ and for the factorization of iterates of affine polynomials over finite fields.