Failure of the congruence Hasse principle for commutators in orientable surface groups

Ghosh, Meiri and Sarnak showed that the commutator equation over $\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{Z})$ satisfies a profinite local to global principle, and that for a prime $\ell\equiv\pm1$ mod $5$ it fails for $\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{Z}[1/\ell])$ with a reciprocity obstruction. We extend the failure to surface groups. For the genus-$2$ surface group $Γ_2$ we construct an explicit representation $ρ:Γ_2\to\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathcal{O}_{K,S})$, where $K=\mathbb{Q}(\sqrt{5})$ and $\mathcal{O}_{K,S}=\mathbb{Z}[\frac{1+\sqrt{5}}{2},\frac{1}{10}]$, whose quotients modulo the maximal ideals are the full groups $\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{F}_q)$ except in residue characteristic $3$, where the quotient has order $24$. For every $k\ge2$ the word $[a_1,b_1]^k$ is not a commutator in $Γ_2$, while its image is a commutator in every one of these quotients. The same holds for every surface group $Γ_g$ with $g\ge2$.

Authors

Publication Details

Journal
arXiv (Cornell University)
Published
2026-10-27
DOI
https://doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.2610.36497
Primary Topic
Advanced Algebra and Geometry
Type
preprint
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preprint

Failure of the congruence Hasse principle for commutators in orientable surface groups

Jianchun Wu
arXiv (Cornell University)
Advanced Algebra and Geometry
preprint

Failure of the congruence Hasse principle for commutators in orientable surface groups

Jianchun Wu
preprint en

Abstract

Ghosh, Meiri and Sarnak showed that the commutator equation over $\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{Z})$ satisfies a profinite local to global principle, and that for a prime $\ell\equiv\pm1$ mod $5$ it fails for $\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{Z}[1/\ell])$ with a reciprocity obstruction. We extend the failure to surface groups. For the genus-$2$ surface group $Γ_2$ we construct an explicit representation $ρ:Γ_2\to\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathcal{O}_{K,S})$, where $K=\mathbb{Q}(\sqrt{5})$ and $\mathcal{O}_{K,S}=\mathbb{Z}[\frac{1+\sqrt{5}}{2},\frac{1}{10}]$, whose quotients modulo the maximal ideals are the full groups $\mathrm{SL}_2(\mathbb{F}_q)$ except in residue characteristic $3$, where the quotient has order $24$. For every $k\ge2$ the word $[a_1,b_1]^k$ is not a commutator in $Γ_2$, while its image is a commutator in every one of these quotients. The same holds for every surface group $Γ_g$ with $g\ge2$.

arXiv (Cornell University)
Advanced Algebra and Geometry
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