Lemma 10.46.2 (0BR7)—The Stacks project

Lemma 10.46.2. Let $k'/k$ be a field extension. The following are equivalent

for each $x \in k'$ there exists an $n > 0$ such that $x^ n \in k$ , and
$k' = k$ or $k$ and $k'$ have characteristic $p > 0$ and either $k'/k$ is a purely inseparable extension or $k$ and $k'$ are algebraic extensions of $\mathbf{F}_ p$ .

Proof. Observe that each of the possibilities listed in (2) satisfies (1). Thus we assume $k'/k$ satisfies (1) and we prove that we are in one of the cases of (2). Discarding the case $k = k'$ we may assume $k' \not= k$ . It is clear that $k'/k$ is algebraic. Hence we may assume that $k'/k$ is a nontrivial finite extension. Let $k'/k'_{sep}/k$ be the separable subextension found in Fields, Lemma 9.14.6. We have to show that $k = k'_{sep}$ or that $k$ is an algebraic over $\mathbf{F}_ p$ . Thus we may assume that $k'/k$ is a nontrivial finite separable extension and we have to show $k$ is algebraic over $\mathbf{F}_ p$ .

Pick $x \in k'$ , $x \not\in k$ . Pick $n, m > 0$ such that $x^ n \in k$ and $(x + 1)^ m \in k$ . Let $\overline{k}$ be an algebraic closure of $k$ . We can choose embeddings $\sigma , \tau : k' \to \overline{k}$ with $\sigma (x) \not= \tau (x)$ . This follows from the discussion in Fields, Section 9.12 (more precisely, after replacing $k'$ by the $k$ -extension generated by $x$ it follows from Fields, Lemma 9.12.8). Then we see that $\sigma (x) = \zeta \tau (x)$ for some $n$ th root of unity $\zeta$ in $\overline{k}$ . Similarly, we see that $\sigma (x + 1) = \zeta ' \tau (x + 1)$ for some $m$ th root of unity $\zeta ' \in \overline{k}$ . Since $\sigma (x + 1) \not= \tau (x + 1)$ we see $\zeta ' \not= 1$ . Then

$\zeta ' (\tau (x) + 1) = \zeta ' \tau (x + 1) = \sigma (x + 1) = \sigma (x) + 1 = \zeta \tau (x) + 1$

implies that

$\tau (x) (\zeta ' - \zeta ) = 1 - \zeta '$

hence $\zeta ' \not= \zeta$ and

$\tau (x) = (1 - \zeta ')/(\zeta ' - \zeta )$

Hence every element of $k'$ which is not in $k$ is algebraic over the prime subfield. Since $k'$ is generated over the prime subfield by the elements of $k'$ which are not in $k$ , we conclude that $k'$ (and hence $k$ ) is algebraic over the prime subfield.

Finally, if the characteristic of $k$ is $0$ , the above leads to a contradiction as follows (we encourage the reader to find their own proof). For every rational number $y$ we similarly get a root of unity $\zeta _ y$ such that $\sigma (x + y) = \zeta _ y\tau (x + y)$ . Then we find

$\zeta \tau (x) + y = \zeta _ y(\tau (x) + y)$

and by our formula for $\tau (x)$ above we conclude $\zeta _ y \in \mathbf{Q}(\zeta , \zeta ')$ . Since the number field $\mathbf{Q}(\zeta , \zeta ')$ contains only a finite number of roots of unity we find two distinct rational numbers $y, y'$ with $\zeta _ y = \zeta _{y'}$ . Then we conclude that

$y - y' = \sigma (x + y) - \sigma (x + y') = \zeta _ y(\tau (x + y)) - \zeta _{y'}\tau (x + y') = \zeta _ y(y - y')$

which implies $\zeta _ y = 1$ a contradiction. $\square$

The Stacks project

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