Frobenius groups and retract rationality

Abstract

Let $k$ be any field, $G$ be a finite group acting on the rational function field $k(x_g:g\in G)$ by $h\cdot x_g=x_{hg}$ for any $h,g\in G$. Define $k(G)=k(x_g:g\in G)^G$. Noether's problem asks whether $k(G)$ is rational (= purely transcendental) over $k$. A weaker notion, retract rationality introduced by Saltman, is also very useful for the study of Noether's problem. We prove that, if $G$ is a Frobenius group with abelian Frobenius kernel, then $k(G)$ is retract $k$-rational for any field $k$ satisfying some mild conditions. As an application, we show that, for any algebraic number field $k$, for any Frobenius group $G$ with Frobenius complement isomorphic to $SL_2(\bm{F}_5)$, there is a Galois extension field $K$ over $k$ whose Galois group is isomorphic to $G$, i.e. the inverse Galois problem is valid for the pair $(G,k)$. The same result is true for any non-solvable Frobenius group if $k(\zeta_8)$ is a cyclic extension of $k$.