36 pages, this is an updated version. Several references have been added. We also improved the presentation significantly and extended our results to modular groups which are Atkin-Lehner extensions. We tried not to change the numbering of Theorems, lemmas, etc. The only changes are the numbers 1.24 and beyond in the introduction of the first version
Many generating series of combinatorially interesting numbers have the property that the sum of the terms of order $<p$ at some suitable point is congruent to a zero of a zeta-function modulo infinitely many primes $p$. Surprisingly, very often these congruences turn out to hold modulo $p^2$ or even $p^3$. We call such congruences supercongruences and in the past 15 years an abundance of them have been discovered. In this paper we show that a large proportion of them can be explained by the use of modular functions and forms.
We prove a supercongruence modulo $p^3$ between the $p$th Fourier coefficient of a weight 6 modular form and a truncated ${}_6F_5$-hypergeometric series. Novel ingredients in the proof are the comparison of two rational approximations to $ζ(3)$ to produce non-trivial harmonic sum identities and the reduction of the resulting congruences between harmonic sums via a congruence between the Apéry numbers and another Apéry-like sequence.
Recently, Chan, Cooper and Sica conjectured two congruences for coefficients of classical 2F1 hypergeometric series which also arise from power series expansions of modular forms in terms of modular functions. We prove these two congruences using combinatorial properties of the coefficients.
By using some hypergeometric series identities, we prove two supercongruences on truncated hypergeometric series, one of which is related to a modular Calabi--Yau threefold, and the other is regarded as $p$-adic analogue of an identity due to Ramanujan.
In examining the relationship between the number of points over $\mathbb{F}_p$ on certain Calabi-Yau manifolds and hypergeometric series which correspond to a particular period of the manifold, Rodriguez-Villegas identified numerically 22 possible supercongruences. We prove one of the outstanding supercongruence conjectures between a special value of a truncated generalized hypergeometric series and the $p$-th Fourier coefficient of a modular form.
In 2003, Rodriguez-Villegas conjectured four supercongruences on the truncated ${}_3F_2$ hypergeometric series for certain modular K3 surfaces, which were gradually proved by several authors. Motivated by some supercongruences on combinatorial numbers such as Apéry numbers and Domb numbers, we establish some new supercongruences on the truncated ${}_3F_2$ hypergeometric series, which extend the four Rodriguez-Villegas supercongruences.
In examining the relationship between the number of points over $\mathbb{F}_p$ on certain Calabi-Yau manifolds and hypergeometric series which correspond to a particular period of the manifold, Rodriguez-Villegas identified 22 possible supercongruences. We provide a framework of congruences covering all 22 cases. Using this framework we prove one of the outstanding supercongruence conjectures between a special value of a truncated ordinary hypergeometric series and the $p$-th Fourier coefficient of a modular form. In the course of this work we also establish two new binomial coefficient-harmon…
Let p be an odd prime. In 1984, Greene introduced the notion of hypergeometric functions over finite fields. Special values of these functions have been of interest as they are related to the number of F_p points on algebraic varieties and to Fourier coefficients of modular forms. In this paper, we explicitly determine these functions modulo higher powers of p and discuss an application to supercongruences. This application uses two non-trivial generalized Harmonic sum identities discovered using the computer summation package Sigma. We illustrate the usage of Sigma in the discovery and proof …
We establish two binomial coefficient--generalized harmonic sum identities using the partial fraction decomposition method. These identities are a key ingredient in the proofs of numerous supercongruences. In particular, in other works of the author, they are used to establish modulo $p^k$ ($k>1$) congruences between truncated generalized hypergeometric series, and a function which extends Greene's hypergeometric function over finite fields to the $p$-adic setting. A specialization of one of these congruences is used to prove an outstanding conjecture of Rodriguez-Villegas which relates a trun…
We prove hypergeometric type identities for a function defined in terms of quotients of the $p$-adic gamma function. We use these identities to prove a supercongruence conjecture of Rodriguez-Villegas between a truncated $_4F_3$ hypergeometric series and the Fourier coefficients of certain weight four modular form.
It is well-known that the Apéry sequences which arise in the irrationality proofs for $ζ(2)$ and $ζ(3)$ satisfy many intriguing arithmetic properties and are related to the $p$th Fourier coefficients of modular forms. In this paper, we prove that the connection to modular forms persists for sequences associated to Brown's cellular integrals and state a general conjecture concerning supercongruences.
We give a $q$-congruence whose specializations $q=-1$ and $q=1$ correspond to supercongruences (B.2) and (H.2) on Van Hamme's 1997 list: $$ \sum_{k=0}^{(p-1)/2}(-1)^k(4k+1)A_k\equiv p(-1)^{(p-1)/2}\pmod{p^3} \quad\text{and}\quad \sum_{k=0}^{(p-1)/2}A_k\equiv a(p)\pmod{p^2}, $$ where $p>2$ is prime, $$ A_k=\prod_{j=0}^{k-1}\biggl(\frac{1/2+j}{1+j}\biggr)^3=\frac1{2^{6k}}{\binom{2k}k}^3 \quad\text{for}\ k=0,1,2,\dots, $$ and $a(p)$ is the $p$-th coefficient of (the weight 3 modular form) $q\prod_{j=1}^\infty(1-q^{4j})^6$. We complement our result with a general common $q$-congruence for related …
We develop an analytical method to prove congruences of the type $$ \sum_{k=0}^{(p^r-1)/d}A_kz^k \equiv ω(z)\sum_{k=0}^{(p^{r-1}-1)/d}A_kz^{pk} \pmod{p^{mr}\mathbb Z_p[[z]]} \quad \text{for}\; r=1,2,\dots, $$ for primes $p>2$ and fixed integers $m,d\ge1$, where $f(z)=\sum_{k=0}^\infty A_kz^k$ is an "arithmetic" hypergeometric series. Such congruences for $m=d=1$ were introduced by Dwork in 1969 as a tool for $p$-adic analytical continuation of $f(z)$. Our proofs of several Dwork-type congruences corresponding to $m\ge2$ (in other words, supercongruences) are based on constructing and proving t…
In this paper, we prove two recently conjectured supercongruences (modulo $p^3$, where $p$ is any prime greater than $3$) of Zhi-Hong Sun on truncated sums involving the Domb numbers. Our proofs involve a number of ingredients such as congruences involving specialized Bernoulli polynomials, harmonic numbers, binomial coefficients, and hypergeometric summations and transformations.
In this paper, a new $q$-supercongruence with two free parameters modulo the fourth power of a cyclotomic polynomial is obtained. Our main auxiliary tools are Watson's $_8ϕ_7$ transformation formula for basic hypergeometric series, the `creative microscoping' method recently introduced by Guo and Zudilin and the Chinese remainder theorem for coprime polynomials. By taking suitable parameter substitutions in the established $q$-supercongruence, some nice congruences involving the Bernoulli numbers are derived.
We give some new $q$-supercongruences on truncated forms of squares of basic hypergeometric series. Most of them are modulo the cube of a cyclotomic polynomial, and two of them are modulo the fourth power of a cyclotomic polynomial. The main ingredients of our proofs are the creative microscoping method, a lemma of El Bachraoui, and the Chinese remainder theorem for coprime polynomials. We also propose several related conjectures for further study.
In 1997, van Hamme developed $p-$adic analogs, for primes $p$, of several series which relate hypergeometric series to values of the gamma function, originally studied by Ramanujan. These analogs relate truncated sums of hypergeometric series to values of the $p-$adic gamma function, and are called Ramanujan type supercongruences. In all, van Hamme conjectured 13 such formulas, three of which were proved by van Hamme himself, and five others have been proved recently using a wide range of methods. Here, we explore four of the remaining five van Hamme supercongruences, revisit some of the prove…
By using the Wilf-Zeilberger method, we prove a novel finite combinatorial identity related to a bivariate generating function for $ζ(2+r+2s)$ (an extension of a Bailey-Borwein-Bradley Apery-like formula for even zeta values). Such identity is then applied to show several supercongruences.
For the purposes of this paper supercongruences are congruences between terminating hypergeometric series and quotients of $p$-adic Gamma functions that are stronger than those one can expect to prove using commutative formal group laws. We prove a number of such supercongruences by using classical hypergeometric transformation formulae. These formulae (see the appendix), most of which are decades or centuries old, allow us to write the terminating series as the ratio of products of of $Γ$-values. At this point sums have become quotients. Writing these $Γ$-quotients as $Γ_p$-quotients, we are …
With the help of a summation of basic hypergeometric series, the creative microscoping method recently introduced by Guo and Zudilin, and the Chinese remainder theorem for coprime polynomials, we find some new $q$-supercongruences. Especially, we give a $q$-analogue of a formula due to Liu [J. Math. Anal. Appl. 497 (2021), Art.~124915].
Several new $q$-supercongruences are obtained using transformation formulas for basic hypergeometric series, together with various techniques such as suitably combining terms, and creative microscoping, a method recently developed by the first author in collaboration with Wadim Zudilin. More concretely, the results in this paper include $q$-analogues of supercongruences (referring to $p$-adic identities remaining valid for some higher power of $p$) established by Long, by Long and Ramakrishna, and several other $q$-supercongruences. The six basic hypergeometric transformation formulas which ar…
We study congruences involving truncated hypergeometric series of the form_rF_{r-1}(1/2,...,1/2;1,...,1;λ)_{(mp^s-1)/2} = \sum_{k=0}^{(mp^s-1)/2} ((1/2)_k/k!)^r λ^k where p is a prime and m, s, r are positive integers. These truncated hypergeometric series are related to the arithmetic of a family of algebraic varieties and exhibit Atkin and Swinnerton-Dyer type congruences. In particular, when r=3, they are related to K3 surfaces. For special values of λ, with s=1 and r=3, our congruences are stronger than what can be predicted by the theory of formal groups because of the presence of ellipti…
In this paper, we prove a new identity for values of the Hurwitz zeta function which contains as particular cases Koecher's identity for odd zeta values, the Bailey-Borwein-Bradley identity for even zeta values and many other interesting formulas related to values of the Hurwitz zeta function. We also get an extension of the bivariate identity of Cohen to values of the Hurwitz zeta function. The main tool we use here is a construction of new Markov-WZ pairs. As application of our results, we prove several conjectures on supercongruences proposed by J. Guillera, W. Zudilin, and Z.-W. Sun.
Rodriguez-Villegas conjectured four supercongruences associated to certain elliptic curves, which were first confirmed by Mortenson by using the Gross-Koblitz formula. In this paper, we aim to prove four supercongruences between two truncated hypergeometric series ${}_2F_1$. This generalizes these four Rodriguez-Villegas supercongruences.
By examining asymptotic behavior of certain infinite basic ($q$-) hypergeometric sums at roots of unity (that is, at a "$q$-microscopic" level) we prove polynomial congruences for their truncations. The latter reduce to non-trivial (super)congruences for truncated ordinary hypergeometric sums, which have been observed numerically and proven rarely. A typical example includes derivation, from a $q$-analogue of Ramanujan's formula $$ \sum_{n=0}^\infty\frac{\binom{4n}{2n}{\binom{2n}{n}}^2}{2^{8n}3^{2n}}\,(8n+1) =\frac{2\sqrt{3}}π, $$ of the two supercongruences $$ S(p-1)\equiv p\biggl(\frac{-3}p\…
Given a prime number $p$, the study of divisibility properties of a sequence $c(n)$ has two contending approaches: $p$-adic valuations and superconcongruences. The former searches for the highest power of $p$ dividing $c(n)$, for each $n$; while the latter (essentially) focuses on the maximal powers $r$ and $t$ such that $c(p^rn)$ is congruent to $c(p^{r-1}n)$ modulo $p^t$. This is called supercongruence. In this note, we prove modest supercongruences for certain sequences that have come to be known as the Almkvist-Zudilin numbers and two other naturally related ones.
For any odd prime p we obtain q-analogues of Van Hamme's supercongruence: $$ \sum_{k=0}^{\frac{p-1}{2}}{2k\choose k}^3\frac{1}{64^k} \equiv 0 \pmod{p^2} \quad\text{for}\quad p\equiv 3\pmod 4, $$ and Rodriguez-Villegas' Beukers-like supercongruences involving products of three binomial coefficients. For example, we prove that \begin{align*} \sum_{k=0}^{\frac{p-1}{2}} {2k\brack k}_{q^2}^3 \frac{q^{2k}}{(-q^2;q^2)_k^2 (-q;q)_{2k}^2} &\equiv 0\pmod{[p]^2} \quad\text{for}\quad p\equiv 3\pmod 4, \\ \sum_{k=0}^{\frac{p-1}{2}}{2k\brack k}_{q^3}\frac{(q;q^3)_k (q^{2};q^3)_{k} q^{3k} }{ (q^{6};q^{6})_k^…
We prove that the graded ring of modular forms of weight divisible by 3 is naturally isomorphic to a certain log canonical ring of the corresponding elliptic modular surface.
This paper gives a simple method for constructing vector-valued Siegel modular forms from scalar-valued ones. The method is efficient in producing the siblings of Delta, the smallest weight cusp forms that appear in low degrees. It also shows the strong relations between these modular forms of different genera. We illustrate this by a number of examples.
The main goal of this paper is to study properties of the iterated integrals of modular forms in the upper halfplane, eventually multiplied by $z^{s-1}$, along geodesics connecting two cusps. This setting generalizes simultaneously the theory of modular symbols and that of multiple zeta values
This paper presents the theory of holomorphic vector valued modular forms from a geometric perspective. More precisely, we define certain holomorphic vector bundles on the modular orbifold of generalized elliptic curves whose sections are vector valued modular forms. This perspective simplifies the theory, and it clarifies the role that exponents of representations of SL_2(Z) play in the holomorphic theory of vector valued modular forms. Further, it allows one to use standard techniques in algebraic geometry to deduce free-module theorems and dimension formulae (deduced previously by other aut…
We use vanishing results for sheaf cohomology on Siegel modular varieties to study two lifting problems: (a) When can Siegel modular forms (mod p) be lifted to characteristic zero? This uses and extends previous results for cusp forms by Stroh and Lan-Suh. (b) When is the restriction of Siegel modular forms to the boundary of the moduli space a surjective map? We investigate this question in arbitrary characteristic, generalising analytic results of Weissauer and Arakawa.
In a letter to Tate, Serre proves that the systems of Hecke eigenvalues given by modular forms (mod p) are the same as the ones given by locally constant functions on an adelic double coset space constructed from the endomorphism algebra of a supersingular elliptic curve. We generalize this result to Siegel modular forms (mod p), proving that the systems of Hecke eigenvalues obtained from them are the same as the ones given by algebraic modular forms (mod p) on a quaternionic unitary group, as defined by Gross. The correspondence is obtained by restricting to the superspecial locus of the modu…
We give an abstract characterization of the Satake compactification of a general Drinfeld modular variety. We prove that it exists and is unique up to unique isomorphism, though we do not give an explicit stratification by Drinfeld modular varieties of smaller rank which is also expected. We construct a natural ample invertible sheaf on it, such that the global sections of its $k$-th power form the space of (algebraic) Drinfeld modular forms of weight $k$. We show how the Satake compactification and modular forms behave under all natural morphisms between Drinfeld modular varieties; in particu…
Lectures on Siegel modular forms given in Nordfjordeid. Besides a survey on Siegel modular forms it presents the joint work with Carel Faber on vector-valued Siegel modular forms of genus 2 and it gives evidence for a conjecture of Harder on congruences between g=1 and g=2 forms.
We study vector-valued Siegel modular forms of genus 2 and level 2. We describe the structure of certain modules of vector-valued modular forms over rings of scalar-valued modular forms.
We study the reduction of Picard modular surfaces modulo an inert prime, mod p and p-adic modular forms. We construct a theta operator on such modular forms and study its poles and its effect on Fourier-Jacobi expansions.
We establish an Eichler-Shimura isomorphism for weakly modular forms of level one. We do this by relating weakly modular forms with rational Fourier coefficients to the algebraic de Rham cohomology of the modular curve with twisted coefficients. This leads to formulae for the periods and quasi-periods of modular forms.
In a letter to Tate (published in Israel J. Math. in 1996), J.-P. Serre proves that the systems of Hecke eigenvalues given by modular forms (mod p) are the same as the ones given by locally constant functions on an adelic double coset space constructed from the endomorphism algebra of a supersingular elliptic curve. We generalize this result to Siegel modular forms, proving that the systems of Hecke eigenvalues given by Siegel modular forms (mod p) are the same as the ones given by algebraic modular forms (mod p) on a quaternionic unitary group, as defined by Gross in Israel J. Math. in 1999. …
These are the notes from a survey talk given at Arbeitstagung 2001 covering the author's work with Lev Borisov and Sorin Popescu on toric varieties, modular forms, and equations of modular curves.
We formulate a detailed conjectural Eichler-Shimura type formula for the cohomology of local systems on a Picard modular surface associated to the group of unitary similitudes $\mathrm{GU}(2,1,\mathbb{Q}(\sqrt{-3}))$. The formula is based on counting points over finite fields on curves of genus three which are cyclic triple covers of the projective line. Assuming the conjecture we are able to calculate traces of Hecke operators on spaces of Picard modular forms. We provide ample evidence for the conjectural formula. Along the way we prove new results on characteristic polynomials of Frobenius …
We construct local charts for the ramified cusps of the Hilbert modular variety of level $Γ_1(\mathfrak{c},\mathfrak{n})$. This allows us, following closely M. Rapoport and C.-L. Chai, to construct arithmetic toroidal and minimal compactifications of these modular varieties. Some applications to modular forms are given. See our joint work with J. Tilouine for other applications.
We prove modularity of formal series of Jacobi forms that satisfy a natural symmetry condition. They are formal analogues of Fourier-Jacobi expansions of Siegel modular forms. From our result and a theorem of Wei Zhang, we deduce Kudla's conjecture on the modularity of generating series of special cycles of arbitrary codimension and for all orthogonal Shimura varieties.
