Work over the finite field . For each set family member form the intersection polynomial
At the characteristic vector of a set , its value is . The given restrictions make for and . Hence these functions are linearly independent: evaluate a purported relation at each set family member to eliminate its coefficient.
Use multilinear reduction on the Boolean cube, replacing every positive power of by . This preserves all evaluations on and cannot increase degree. The multilinear polynomials of degree at most have basis for . Their dimension is , and therefore
where for . The proof also covers a list whose distinct integers have repeated residues: no assumption of distinct residues is needed for this first bound.
To obtain the sharper conclusion, suppose the common size residue avoids . If , no set on this ground set can have the required residue, so the set family is empty. Otherwise, add the modular-size auxiliary polynomials
again understood as functions after multilinear reduction on the Boolean cube. They have degree at most , and all vanish on the set family's characteristic vectors of sets.
The are linearly independent. Indeed, evaluate on with :
The first factor is nonzero in the finite field. Starting with and proceeding in increasing cardinality shows for every such .
Moreover, the combined list consisting of the and the is linearly independent. Evaluation at each first kills the coefficient of ; the preceding argument then kills all remaining coefficients. Comparing this list with the dimension of the degree-at-most- space yields
This is a nonuniform common-residue version of the Frankl-Wilson theorem; exact equality of all member sizes was never used.
The exclusion of the small residues is necessary. A concrete example with is , , , the residue list , and the set family of all two-element subsets. Every member has size residue , outside that list, while distinct members intersect in zero or one element. But
Here the omitted condition fails at . Thus the example satisfies all the other hypotheses, rather than relying on a vacuous case.
Write for the degree of a central simple algebra, so . Choose a finite Galois splitting field of a central simple algebra for and an isomorphism . The reduced norm is
The existence of a finite separable splitting field is a standard structural property of a central simple algebra; passing to its Galois closure supplies .
Every -algebra automorphism of is inner. Here is the matrix-unit argument for the inner automorphisms of a matrix algebra result. For an automorphism , choose in the image of , and set . Then . The are nonzero and independent, and their number is , so they form a basis. Relative to that basis acts on each matrix unit in the usual way. Thus for some . Determinants are unchanged by conjugation, proving independence of .
For , compare with the isomorphism obtained by applying to matrix entries and to the scalar factor of . Their difference is again inner. For , this shows . The determinant therefore belongs to . In fact, for a -basis , the same comparison shows that all coefficients of
are fixed by the Galois group, so the reduced norm is a homogeneous polynomial of degree over . This coefficient argument also applies over finite fields, where equality merely as functions would not identify polynomials.
Finally, two finite splitting fields embed into a common finite splitting extension. Determinant commutes with scalar extension, and over that common extension the two matrix identifications differ by an inner automorphism. Hence the resulting polynomials agree over . The reduced norm is independent of both the splitting field and the matrix identification. It is multiplicative, and exactly when is not invertible: a matrix with nonzero determinant is invertible after scalar extension, and invertibility descends by the invertibility of the -linear multiplication map. In a division algebra the only element of reduced norm zero is zero.
For a nonnegative integer , a Cr field is a field over which every homogeneous polynomial of positive degree in variables has a nontrivial zero. Thus a C1 field uses the bound , and a C2 field uses .
The required field theorems are as follows. The Chevalley-Warning theorem implies that every finite field is : the number of zeros of a polynomial with degree smaller than its number of variables is divisible by the characteristic, and for a homogeneous polynomial the origin is already a zero. The Lang-Nagata theorem for Ci fields states that a finitely generated extension of transcendence degree of a field is . The Tsen theorem states that the function field of a curve over an algebraically closed field is . In particular, finite fields, algebraically closed fields and fields such as are examples of fields. A function field of one variable over a finite field is by the Lang theorem. These are statements of the theorems; no theorem proof is needed here.
For the requested finite extension stability of C1 fields, let and choose a -basis of . Given a homogeneous of degree with , substitute and take the field norm:
The field norm is the determinant of multiplication on the -dimensional -space , hence a homogeneous polynomial of degree in its coordinates. Consequently is homogeneous of degree in variables over . The property gives a nonzero coordinate vector with . Its corresponding vector is nonzero, since the are a basis. The norm of a field element vanishes only for the zero element, so . Every finite extension of a field is . This proof includes inseparable finite extensions, because the determinant definition of the field norm requires no separability.
Let be the full constant field of . It is a finite extension of the given finite field, hence is itself finite. Since is perfect and algebraically closed in , the one-variable extension is regular. In a common algebraic closure, put . Then is the function field of a geometrically integral curve over the algebraically closed field .
The Tsen theorem makes a field, and the preceding argument gives . Thus is a matrix algebra. A splitting isomorphism and its inverse involve only finitely many coefficients in . All these coefficients lie in for some finite extension , since is the union of these finite constant extensions. The two isomorphism identities consequently already hold over , so splits there.
Finite extensions of a finite field are cyclic, and regularity gives and preserves their degree under this scalar extension. Therefore
is cyclic. A finite cyclic extension of constants splits . This is cyclic splitting by extension of constants. The argument does not assert that the splitting extension has degree exactly the index of ; a larger cyclic constant extension is sufficient for the requested conclusion.
The general modular form, the nonuniform Frankl-Wilson theorem, can be stated as follows. Let be a prime number, and let have elements. Suppose has for every member, while for any distinct members. Then
The uniform Frankl-Wilson theorem sharpens this to when all members have size and . Both forms require a prime modulus and exclusion of the self-intersection residue.
For the general proof, work over the finite field . Associate to each member the intersection polynomial
At the characteristic vectors of sets , this is zero if , and nonzero if . Thus these polynomials, regarded as functions on the Boolean hypercube, are linearly independent: evaluating any relation at isolates its coefficient. Apply multilinear reduction on the Boolean cube, replacing every positive power of a variable by that variable. Values on the Boolean hypercube remain unchanged, and the resulting multilinear polynomials have degree at most . Their ambient space has a monomial basis consisting of for , with dimension . This proves the general bound, including .
For completeness, obtain the uniform sharpening without dividing by factorials in a finite field. For put and . The functions with are linearly independent. Indeed, a relation gives with , so is supported only on weights in . With boundary weights , this set has a gap of at least : either consecutive allowed weights differ by , or its terminal gap does, since . The alternating sum of over any interval of free coordinates vanishes by its degree. Across that gap only one endpoint level can contribute, forcing to vanish there. Delete that level and repeat across the enlarged gap until is empty. Hence , and independence of the square-free monomials gives the claim. Adjoin these functions to the . Evaluation at each family vector eliminates the coefficients of , since vanishes there; the claim eliminates all remaining coefficients. Counting dimensions yields
The case permits at most one member directly. The gap argument is an instance of the modular layer vanishing lemma.
For the final application, enumerate the distinct sets as and let be their characteristic vectors of sets. If , the desired bound is immediate for . Otherwise , because intersects another member in points. At most one member can have size : two distinct -sets cannot have intersection size . The Gram matrix of these vectors is
For real coefficients ,
All terms are nonnegative, with . If the expression vanishes, every coefficient corresponding to a set of size greater than is zero. At most one coefficient remains, and the first term forces it to be zero as well. Thus the characteristic vectors of sets are linearly independent in , proving the constant-intersection family bound
This proof explicitly covers the possible member of size exactly ; assuming all diagonal corrections were strictly positive would miss that case. Positivity of is essential: when , the empty set and all singleton sets give members.
Set and , so that . The dimension of a bounded-total-degree polynomial space in variables over is . If were smaller than this dimension, evaluation at the points of would impose fewer homogeneous linear conditions than unknown coefficients. The rank-nullity theorem would give a nonzero multivariate polynomial of total degree at most , vanishing on .
For every , select one of the promised rich affine lines in a vector space through , and write it as with . The polynomial restriction to a line has degree at most , and at least distinct roots of a polynomial from . By the root bound for a polynomial, is identically zero, so . Since this works for every , vanishes at all points of .
The Schwartz-Zippel lemma says that a nonzero multivariate polynomial of total degree has at most zeros on this grid. Here , so that count is strictly less than , a contradiction. The distinction between a formal polynomial and its function on a finite field is crucial: our degree bound is what rules out a nonzero polynomial vanishing everywhere.
We have proved the stronger quantitative rich line covering bound over a finite field
Thus , as required. The implied constant may depend on the fixed dimension . The very large numerical lower bound on is more than this proof needs.
Write a matrix in the upper unitriangular group as . Here , and its only potentially nonzero entry in is . The binomial theorem therefore gives the unitriangular matrix power formula
For an odd prime number , both and vanish in the finite field . Thus . A nonidentity has order dividing the prime (by the same exponent-division argument as in part (i)), and so has order exactly .
For , take and . Then , while . This element has order , not . Hence every nonidentity element has order exactly for odd . The counterexample at accounts for the quadratic term in the matrix power formula.
Let be a finite integral domain. For any , multiplication is injective: implies , hence because there are no zero divisors. An injective map of a finite set to itself is surjective, so for some . Every nonzero element is invertible; therefore a finite integral domain is a field.
For an irreducible polynomial , consider a nonzero class in the quotient ring . Since does not divide , irreducibility gives . The Euclidean algorithm in the polynomial ring gives polynomials with . Modulo , . Thus the quotient by an irreducible polynomial is a field.
For a field with four elements, use
The quadratic has no root in , so is irreducible. Write . Polynomial division shows the elements are , with . Its multiplication table is
For a field with nine elements, use
The values of at are , so the quadratic is irreducible. Every class is uniquely , , with . These nine classes form a finite field; multiplication is , with coefficients modulo three.
The squares in the finite field are . For , the values of and the numbers of possible are respectively
Adding yields . The Trace of Frobenius is . The trace of the square of an elliptic-curve endomorphism is , so the elliptic-curve point count over a finite field gives
For example, this trace identity follows from and .
One suitable second elliptic curve is
Here , so its elliptic-curve discriminant is nonzero. Its complete list of rational points is , obtained by checking the seven -values. For the tangent slope is in , and the elliptic-curve addition formula gives . Consequently has order four and .
For the modular Heisenberg group, the three independent entries each have choices, so
The multiplication and commutation calculations work over the finite field exactly as over . Taking and shows that
Let . Its powers exhaust the centre and has order , giving the group presentation
Let and . Their images in the quotient group translate the entries independently. They commute modulo the centre, have order , and generate distinct pairs. Therefore
For context, , with central. All conclusions above include ; one must not infer that every nonidentity element of has order two, since .
The Frankl-Wilson theorem. Let be a prime number, let have elements, and let . Suppose that for every , whereas for all distinct members. Then
with terms beyond understood as zero.
Work over the finite field . For each member define its intersection polynomial
Replace every positive power by to obtain a multilinear polynomial of polynomial degree at most . This Boolean multilinearization preserves its values at every characteristic vector of a set. At the characteristic vector of a set ,
It is zero if and nonzero if . Evaluating a proposed linear relation at each therefore establishes linear independence of the . The vector space of multilinear polynomials of polynomial degree at most has the basis of monomials , , of size . This proves the Frankl-Wilson theorem by the polynomial method in combinatorics. The empty product for is , and the argument still applies.
The constant-intersection family bound, directly. Write and assume . The cases are immediate. If , the nonempty members are pairwise disjoint and there can also be the empty set, giving
For , every member has size at least . If every member has size strictly greater than , form the real matrix whose rows are their characteristic vectors of sets. Its Gram matrix satisfies
For any nonzero real vector ,
Thus the rows are linearly independent and . If a member has size , it lies inside every other member. The sets , , are nonempty and pairwise disjoint, so . This also gives
These bounds are sharp: the singletons together with attain at , while all complements of singletons attain at when .
The constant t-wise intersection dichotomy. In its substantive form the last argument requires . The printed statement does not explicitly impose this. Without it the -fold condition can be vacuous and the claimed dichotomy is false: take , , , , and . There is no -tuple to test, no common -set, and , so . We therefore prove the intended assertion for and record this necessary qualification.
If , the first alternative always holds with . Suppose . Choose indices attaining the minimum intersection size , and write
For each of the remaining indices put . The hypothesis gives for distinct remaining indices. This reduces the constant t-wise intersection dichotomy to a constant-intersection family bound on the -element set . The two possibilities are treated below.
Compute each scheme-theoretic fibre by tensoring with the residue field of the chosen base point.
For the first map, put for a point of and let be the image of in . Then
If the characteristic of a field is not two and , the two factors and are coprime, so the Chinese remainder theorem gives : the scheme-theoretic fibre is two distinct -points. If , its ring is , a dual number ring, so it is a nonreduced double point. In characteristic two, at every point, giving a nonreduced double point in every scheme-theoretic fibre. This covers the generic point, where , as well as closed points defined by irreducible polynomials.
For the arithmetic map, the generic scheme-theoretic fibre is
Over a closed point it is . At this is , since . For odd , the finite field multiplicative group is cyclic, and is a square exactly when . Thus
In the second case there is one degree-two closed point over , which becomes two points after extending the residue field to an algebraic closure. The case remains nonreduced after such extension.
For , the unique source point maps to the generic point . Since all nonzero integers are invertible in ,
Indeed , whereas . The distinction between a reduced split scheme-theoretic fibre and a nonreduced double point is essential in the first two examples.
A set of prime numbers has Dirichlet density if the following limit exists:
Equivalently, the denominator can be , since that sum is . Adding or removing finitely many prime numbers leaves the Dirichlet density unchanged.
Put and . This is the splitting field of , whose four roots of a polynomial are . The polynomial is an Eisenstein polynomial at , so . Since is contained in the real numbers, it does not contain , giving . Thus is a Galois extension of degree . Its Galois group is the dihedral group of order : the field automorphisms , and , satisfy and .
For an odd prime number , the condition means that the finite field contains all fourth roots of unity. Under this condition, is a quartic residue exactly when has a root in ; multiplying that root by gives all four distinct roots. Conversely, complete splitting of over gives both a fourth root of and a primitive fourth root of unity, so it also forces .
The polynomial discriminant of is . Hence every odd prime number is unramified in , and the root-splitting criterion is equivalent to its Frobenius automorphism acting trivially on all the roots. Since the roots generate , this is equivalent to the Frobenius automorphism being the identity, or to being a completely split prime of . The Chebotarev density theorem says that the unramified prime numbers with Frobenius conjugacy class have Dirichlet density . Here , so
Work over the finite field . Reduce polynomials modulo , so their monomials are square-free. The binary Reed-Muller code consists of the evaluation vectors of polynomials of degree at most at all points of , in a fixed order. This is a linear code of length and dimension , for . Square-free monomials give independent evaluation functions, as follows inductively by splitting according to the last variable.
The minimum Hamming distance of a linear code equals its least nonzero Hamming weight. The result is
Here is the repetition code, while is the full binary vector space and has distance one. For the induction step, write , where and . Its evaluation vector is , the Reed-Muller bar-product recursion. If , its nonzero Hamming weight is at least , with the full-space endpoint treated as above. If , every position where contributes exactly one to the sum of the two weights; hence the weight is at least . The monomial is one exactly on points, attaining the bound. Degrees greater than give the same full code; the zero code at negative degree has no nonzero word whose weight could define a finite minimum.