Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2008 iii Paper 7 3 c Solution Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-14
Since is a regular local ring, is finite. Choose a chain of prime ideals of length ,Such a chain exists because the supremum defining this finite integer Krull dimension is attained; a maximal-length chain in a local ring ends at its maximal ideal.
For each , the ideal is finitely generated because is Noetherian. This ensures that its extension consists precisely of series all of whose coefficients lie in : if , write each coefficient as and gather them into the finitely many series . Thus coefficient reduction givesThe coefficient ring is an integral domain, and so is its formal power series ring: the first nonzero coefficient of a product is the product of the first nonzero coefficients of its factors. Hence each is prime. Also , so the strict inclusions persist upon extension. Finally, , since its image in is nonzero. We obtain the prime chainof length . Therefore . Together with part (b),Its embedding dimension is also , by part (b), so is itself a regular local ring. This proves that formal power series preserve regular local rings.