Kronecker and Abelian Extensions
Kronecker first postulated that the values of elliptic functions at torsion points should be enough to generate all abelian extensions for imaginary quadratic fields, an idea that went back to Eisenstein in some cases, and even to Gauss. This became known as the Kronecker Jugendtraum; and was certainly what had prompted Hilbert's remark above, since it makes explicit class field theory in the way the roots of unity do for abelian extensions of the rational number field, via Shimura's reciprocity law.
Indeed, let K be an imaginary quadratic field with class field H. Let E be an elliptic curve with complex multiplication by the integers of K, defined over H. Then the maximal abelian extension of K is generated by the x-coordinates of the points of finite order on some Weierstrass model for E over H.
Many generalisations have been sought of Kronecker's ideas; they do however lie somewhat obliquely to the main thrust of the Langlands philosophy, and there is no definitive statement currently known.
Read more about this topic: Complex Multiplication
Famous quotes containing the word extensions:
“If we focus exclusively on teaching our children to read, write, spell, and count in their first years of life, we turn our homes into extensions of school and turn bringing up a child into an exercise in curriculum development. We should be parents first and teachers of academic skills second.”
—Neil Kurshan (20th century)