Vortrag im Schwerpunkt Reelle Geometrie und Algebra
Freitag, 21. November 2008, um 14:00 Uhr in F426 (Schwerpunktkolloquium) James O'Shea (Dublin) Sums of squares in composition algebras
The level of a ring R is the least number of squares in R which sum to -1. The level problem for a given class of rings is
to determine what values are realisable as the level of such rings. In this talk, we will recall some elementary properties
of quaternion and octonion algebras, consider sums of squares in these structures, and highlight recent progress on the
associated level problems.
