For a full-rank Euclidean lattice , its dual lattice is
If , then , and . The characters of a real torus identify the additive dual lattice with the multiplicative character group by
The map is well defined precisely because , and is injective. For surjectivity, a continuous group homomorphism from the compact torus into has compact image. Its modulus has logarithm a homomorphism into with compact image, hence is zero, so the image lies in the unit circle. Pull the character back to . Its continuous real lift under , normalized to zero at the origin, is additive: its additive defect is an integer-valued continuous function and vanishes at the origin. A continuous additive function is for a unique . Triviality on says , proving surjectivity.
Use the Fourier transform convention , and take to be a Schwartz function. The periodization of a Schwartz function is smooth and -periodic. On a fundamental cell , the coefficient of the torus character is
The equality follows by translating each cell and using . The rapidly convergent Fourier series can be evaluated at zero, yielding the Poisson summation formula for a Euclidean lattice
This argument keeps track of the covolume factor rather than tacitly assuming a unit-volume lattice.
For in the complex upper half-plane, let . Scaling the self-dual real Gaussian function gives its Fourier transform at , , and holomorphic continuation in gives the complex Gaussian Fourier transform
The branch is with the logarithm on the right half-plane; it is positive for . Both the integrals and the lattice sums are locally normally convergent on the complex upper half-plane. Applying the Poisson summation formula proves the lattice theta functional equation
No integrality or self-duality hypothesis on the lattice is needed.
Put , and . The Epstein zeta function converges absolutely for , and its Mellin transform representation is
At infinity, decays exponentially. Define the entire function
On , substitute and then . Isolate the two elementary terms before integrating; this gives the pole-subtracted theta integral for an Epstein zeta function
The formula initially holds for and continues the completed Epstein zeta function meromorphically to all . Apply the same formula to the dual lattice at , using and . The entire terms and the two rational terms match, proving
Finally also continues meromorphically. Its only pole is a simple one at , with residue ; the pole of the completed function at zero is cancelled by , and . The residues and this cancellation make explicit why subtracting the constant theta term was necessary.
For a full Euclidean lattice , its dual lattice is
For a Schwartz function, the Poisson summation formula for a Euclidean lattice states
To prove it, periodize over . The resulting function on has Fourier coefficient at . Evaluating its absolutely convergent Fourier series at zero gives the identity. The same proof applies under the usual weaker hypotheses ensuring convergence of both sides.
Poisson summation formula for a Euclidean lattice Created 2026-09-28 Updated 2026-10-14
Let be a full-rank Euclidean lattice, with covolume and dual lattice . For a Schwartz function use the Fourier transform convention
Then the Poisson summation formula becomes
Both series have absolute convergence. To see the normalization, apply integer-lattice Poisson summation to . The change of variables formula gives , yielding both the reciprocal covolume factor and the dual lattice argument. The factor is the physical lattice-point density. In particular, for spacing ,
For the Gaussian function with , the product of the one-dimensional Gaussian Fourier transforms gives
Here is the Euclidean norm. As a normalization check, take . Its covolume is , and its dual lattice is , so
This also follows by multiplying two Gaussian Poisson summation identities with parameters and . If one instead uses an angular Fourier transform kernel , the reciprocal frequencies are , while the prefactor remains .
Spectrum of a flat torus Created 2026-10-06 Updated 2026-10-14
With the nonnegative Laplace-Beltrami operator, a frequency in the dual lattice gives the eigenfunction and eigenvalue . Its multiplicity is the number of dual vectors with that norm. Fourier series prove completeness. In dimension two the shortest vector, shortest independent vector and covolume determine a reduced Gram matrix, proving spectral rigidity.
For a nonzero fractional ideal of a number field, its trace-dual lattice is the fractional ideal
The equality follows from the definition of the inverse different and invertibility of fractional ideals. Under the positive metric on the Minkowski embedding of a number field, the Euclidean dual lattice of is : coordinatewise complex conjugation converts the positive inner product into the trace pairing. This assertion does not require that conjugation preserve the number field itself.
The vector-length multiset of a rank-two Euclidean lattice determines it up to an orthogonal map. Let be the shortest nonzero length. Removing two copies of each positive integer multiple of removes one primitive lattice line; the shortest remaining length is the shortest independent-vector length. Those two vectors form a lattice basis: otherwise a nonzero point in the centred basis parallelogram would be an independent lattice vector of length less than . Lattice-point density determines the covolume . The basis Gram matrix then has diagonal entries and absolute off-diagonal entry . This proves two-dimensional spectral rigidity for a flat torus through its dual lattice.