Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2021 iii Paper 123 2 Solution 2026-09-28
For each place of a number field , let be the corresponding completion, and for finite let be its valuation ring. The adele ring is the restricted productIts restricted product topology has basic open sets , where every is open and at all but finitely many finite places.
First take . The neighborhoodof zero meets the diagonal copy of only in zero: a rational number lying in every is an integer, and the only integer in the indicated real interval is zero. Thus is discrete in .
Every rational adele is congruent modulo to an element ofIndeed, the finitely many negative -adic principal parts can be removed simultaneously by subtracting a rational number, using the Chinese remainder theorem; subtracting an integer then moves the real component into . This set is compact by the compactness of , the compactness of every , and the Tychonoff theorem. Its image covers the quotient, so is compact.
Now choose a -basis of the number field . The given topological isomorphismidentifies the additive pair with . A finite product of discrete subgroups is discrete, andis compact.
The idele group iswhere the distinguished subgroup at a finite place is . It carries the corresponding restricted product topology on the idele group. The inclusion is continuous: the inverse image of a basic adelic open set is locally a product of open subsets of , and outside finitely many places every idele component already belongs to .
It is not a homeomorphism onto its image. Let be the th rational prime and define the idele to equal at the place over and everywhere else. In the adele topology, : the difference is zero at every fixed place once is large, while at the single moving place. In the idele topology the sequence does not converge to , because the open neighborhoodcontains no : its -component has positive valuation and is not a unit. Hence the inverse of on its image is not continuous.