Crystalline Cohomology - Applications

Applications

For schemes in characteristic p, crystalline cohomology theory can handle questions about p-torsion in cohomology groups better than p-adic étale cohomology. This makes it a natural backdrop for much of the work on p-adic L-functions.

Crystalline cohomology, from the point of view of number theory, fills a gap in the l-adic cohomology information, which occurs exactly where there are 'equal characteristic primes'. Traditionally the preserve of ramification theory, crystalline cohomology converts this situation into Dieudonné module theory, giving an important handle on arithmetic problems. Conjectures with wide scope on making this into formal statements were enunciated by Jean-Marc Fontaine, the resolution of which is called p-adic Hodge theory.