Mordell equation with prime-power constant

diophantine equationsdivisibilityelliptic-curvesmordell-curvesnumber theory

(This question is somewhat related, but is different from this earlier question.)

I am interested in a specific case of the Mordell equation:
$$E : y^2 = x^3 + k$$
where $k=q^t$, for some prime $q \equiv 1 \pmod 4$ and $t \equiv 1 \pmod 4$. Also, I will restrict $x$ to be even. It follows that $y$ is odd.

Question #1: Following the lead in the hyperlinked MSE question, does it follow that $E(\mathbb{Q})$ is isomorphic to $\mathbb{Z}/(t+1)\mathbb{Z}$?

I do not know how to answer Question #1. Any hints would be appreciated.

By the Nagell-Lutz theorem, we can narrow down the possibilities to
$$y \in \{\pm 1, \pm 3, \pm q, \pm 3q, \pm q^2, \pm 3q^2, \ldots, \pm q^{t-1}, \pm 3q^{t-1}, \pm q^t, \pm 3q^t\}$$
since the discriminant of $E$ computes to
$$D = -27q^{2t}$$
based from the Wikipedia hyperlink.

Question #2: How do I eliminate these possibilities? Any hints would be appreciated.

Best Answer

First, notice that an elliptic curve $E/K$ given by \begin{equation}\tag{$\star$} E : y^2 = x^3 + k \end{equation} is isomorphic to the curve $$E' : y^2 = x^3 + u^6 k$$ for any $u \in K^*$ by replacing $x$ by $u^2x$ and $y$ by $u^3y$. Hence by removing $6^{th}$ powers we are looking at

$$E : y^2 = x^3 + q^t$$

where $t = 1, 3, 5$ (in your case - I will deal with all $t = 0, ..., 5$ below).

Now, there is no reason to believe that when $q \equiv 1 \pmod{4}$ that $E/\mathbb{Q}$ will have rank $0$, and in particular when $q = 5$ and $t = 1$ the rank is $\geq 1$ (it is harder to show that equality holds) since $P = (-1, 2)$ has infinite order (this can be seen since e.g., $3P$ is some horrific fraction so Lutz-Nagell would yield a contradiction). Thus I will discard the question on $E(\mathbb{Q})$ and ask it instead for the torsion subgroup $E(\mathbb{Q})_{tors}$.

I'm not sure if one can use Lutz-Nagell to do a case analysis here, but it is certainly harder than using results about $E(\mathbb{Q}_p)$ - so I will do that. Firstly notice that $E(\mathbb{Q}) \subset E(\mathbb{Q}_p)$.

If $q \neq 5$, $E$ has good reduction at $p = 5$ (by your discriminant calculation - although you are missing a factor of $16$). By formal groups $E_1(\mathbb{Q}_5) \cong (\mathbb{Z}_5, +)$ which is torsion free (Silverman AEC IV 6.4 and VII 2.2). Hence $$E(\mathbb{Q})_{tors} \hookrightarrow E(\mathbb{Q}_5)_{tors} \hookrightarrow E(\mathbb{Q}_5)/E_1(\mathbb{Q}_5) \cong \tilde{E}(\mathbb{F}_5)$$

You can check that for curves of the form $(\star)$ have $6$ points. Hence $\#E(\mathbb{Q})_{tors} | 6$.

We deal with $q = 5$ separately. As above in this case $E$ has good reduction at $11$, and we have that $\#E(\mathbb{F}_{11}) = 12$ for each $t = 0, ..., 5$ - so $\#E(\mathbb{Q})_{tors} | 12$.

Aside: The $5$ and $11$ do not come out of thin air. If $E: y^2 = x^3 + k$ where $k \in \mathbb{Z} \setminus \{0\}$, can you prove that $\#E(\mathbb{F}_p) = p + 1$ for every $p \equiv 2 \pmod 3$ not dividing $2, 3$ or $k$?

Thus we only need to check whether $E$ has rational $2$ or $3$ torsion. The 2-torsion is easy, $E$ has 2-torsion if and only if $x^3 + q^t$ has a root. This is the case if and only if $t = 0, 3$, and there is at most $1$ root - hence at most $1$ 2-torsion point.

The $3$-torsion points on $E$ are the inflection points. The Hessian determinant of $X^3 + kZ^3 - Y^2Z$ is $$24X(3q^tZ^2 + Y^2)$$ hence we have affine 3-torsion points if and only if there is a point $(x, y) \in E(\mathbb{Q})$ satisfying $$24x(3q^t + y^2) = 0$$

Since $3q^t > 0$ the second factor cannot be $0$, hence $x = 0$. In that case $y^2 = q^t$, hence $E(\mathbb{Q})$ contains a $3$-torsion point if and only if $t$ is even.

Thus \begin{align*} E(\mathbb{Q})_{tors} &= \begin{cases} \{O\} &t \equiv 1, 5 \pmod{6} \\ \mathbb{Z}/2\mathbb{Z} &t \equiv 3 \pmod{6} \\ \mathbb{Z}/3\mathbb{Z} &t \equiv 2, 4 \pmod{6} \\ \mathbb{Z}/6\mathbb{Z} &t \equiv 0 \pmod{6} \end{cases} \end{align*}


My challenge to you OP, can you generalise the above so that we do not need to assume that $k$ is a prime power?

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