arXiv subjects
Publications and source records attributed to Yiannis Sakellaridis.
We propose a duality in the relative Langlands program. This duality pairs a Hamiltonian space for a group $G$ with a Hamiltonian space under its dual group $\check{G}$, and recovers at a numerical level the relationship between a period on $G$ and an $L$-function attached to $\check{G}$; it is an arithmetic analog of the electric-magnetic duality of boundary conditions in four-dimensional supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory.
Transfer operators are conjectural "operators of functoriality," which transfer test measures and (relative) characters from one homogeneous space to another. In previous work, I computed transfer operators associated to spherical varieties of rank one, and gave an interpretation of them in terms of geometric quantization. In this paper, I study how these operators vary in the horospherical limits of these varieties, where they have a conceptual interpretation related to scattering theory. I also revisit Jacquet's Hankel transform for the Kuznetsov formula, which is related to the functional equation of the standard L-function of GL(n), and provide an interpretation of it in terms of quantization.
The near-completion of the program of endoscopy poses the question of what lies next. This article takes a broad view of ideas beyond the program of endoscopy, highlighting the connections among them, and emphasizing the relationship between local and global aspects. Central among those ideas is the one proposed in a 2000 lecture of R. P. Langlands, aiming to extract from the stable trace formula of a group G the bulk of those automorphic representations in the image of the conjectural functorial lift corresponding to a morphism of L-groups ${^LH} \to {^LG}$. With the extension of the problem of functoriality to the "relative" setting of spherical varieties and related spaces, some structure behind such comparisons has started to reveal itself. In a seemingly unrelated direction, a program initiated by Braverman--Kazhdan, also around 2000, to generalize the Godement--Jacquet proof of the functional equation to arbitrary L-functions, has received renewed attention in recent years. We survey ideas and developments in this direction, as well, and discuss the relationship between the two programs.
According to the Langlands functoriality conjecture, broadened to the setting of spherical varieties (of which reductive groups are special cases), a map between L-groups of spherical varieties should give rise to a functorial transfer of their local and automorphic spectra. The "Beyond Endoscopy" proposal predicts that this transfer will be realized as a comparison between the (relative) trace formulas of these spaces. In this paper we establish the local transfer for the identity map between L-groups, for spherical affine homogeneous spaces X=H\G whose dual group is SL(2) or PGL(2) (with G and H split). More precisely, we construct a transfer operator between orbital integrals for the (X x X)/G-relative trace formula, and orbital integrals for the Kuznetsov formula of PGL(2) or SL(2). Besides the L-group, another invariant attached to X is a certain L-value, and the space of test measures for the Kuznetsov formula is enlarged, to accommodate the given L-value. The fundamental lemma for this transfer operator is proven in a forthcoming paper of Johnstone and Krishna. The transfer operator is given explicitly in terms of Fourier convolutions, making it suitable for a global comparison of trace formulas by the Poisson summation formula, hence for a uniform proof, in rank one, of the relations between periods of automorphic forms and special values of L-functions.
We discuss generalizations of the Langlands program, from reductive groups to the local and automorphic spectra of spherical varieties, and to more general representations arising as "quantizations" of suitable Hamiltonian spaces. To a spherical $G$-variety $X$, one associates a dual group ${^LG_X}$ and an $L$-value (encoded in a representation of ${^LG_X}$), which conjecturally describe the local and automorphic spectra of the variety. This sets up a problem of functoriality, for any morphism ${^LG_X}\to {^LG_Y}$ of dual groups. We review, and generalize, Langlands' "beyond endoscopy" approach to this problem. Then, we describe the cotangent bundles of quotient stacks of the relative trace formula, and show that transfer operators of functoriality between relative trace formulas in rank 1 can be interpreted as a change of "geometric quantization" for these cotangent stacks.
The goal of this article and its precursor is to demonstrate, by example, the existence of "transfer operators" betweeen relative trace formulas, which generalize the scalar transfer factors of endoscopy. These transfer operators have all properties that one could expect from a trace formula comparison: matching, fundamental lemma for the Hecke algebra, transfer of (relative) characters. Most importantly, and quite surprisingly, they appear to be of abelian nature (at least, in the low-rank examples considered in this paper), even though they encompass functoriality relations of non-abelian harmonic analysis. Thus, they are amenable to application of the Poisson summation formula in order to perform the global comparison. Moreover, we show that these abelian transforms have some structure -- which presently escapes our understanding in its entirety -- as deformations of well-understood operators when the spaces under consideration are replaced by their "asymptotic cones". In this second paper we use Rankin-Selberg theory to prove the local transfer behind Rudnick's 1990 thesis (comparing the stable trace formula for $\operatorname{SL}_2$ with the Kuznetsov formula) and Venkatesh's 2002 thesis (providing a "beyond endoscopy" proof of functorial transfer from tori to $\operatorname{GL}_2$). As it turns out, the latter is not completely disjoint from endoscopic transfer -- in fact, our proof "factors" through endoscopic transfer. We also study the functional equation of the symmetric-square $L$-function for $\operatorname{GL}_2$, and show that it is governed by an explicit "Hankel operator" at the level of the Kuznetsov formula, which is also of abelian nature. A similar theory for the standard $L$-function was previously developed (in a different language) by Jacquet.
Let X be an affine spherical variety, possibly singular, and $L^+X$ its arc space. The intersection complex of $L^+X$, or rather of its finite-dimensional formal models, is conjectured to be related to special values of local unramified L-functions. Such relationships were previously established in Braverman-Finkelberg-Gaitsgory-Mirkovic for the affine closure of the quotient of a reductive group by the unipotent radical of a parabolic, and in Bouthier-Ngo-Sakellaridis for toric varieties and L-monoids. In this paper, we compute this intersection complex for the large class of those spherical G-varieties whose dual group is equal to the Langlands dual group of G, and the stalks of its nearby cycles on the horospherical degeneration of X. We formulate the answer in terms of a Kashiwara crystal, which conjecturally corresponds to a finite-dimensional representation of the dual group determined by the set of B-invariant valuations on X. We prove the latter conjecture in many cases. Under the sheaf-function dictionary, our calculations give a formula for the Plancherel density of the IC function of $L^+X$ as a ratio of local L-values for a large class of spherical varieties.
The Langlands functoriality conjecture, as reformulated in the "beyond endoscopy" program, predicts comparisons between the (stable) trace formulas of different groups $G_1, G_2$ for every morphism ${^LG}_1\to {^LG}_2$ between their $L$-groups. This conjecture can be seen as a special case of a more general conjecture, which replaces reductive groups by spherical varieties and the trace formula by its generalization, the relative trace formula. The goal of this article and its continuation is to demonstrate, by example, the existence of "transfer operators" betweeen relative trace formulas, that generalize the scalar transfer factors of endoscopy. These transfer operators have all properties that one could expect from a trace formula comparison: matching, fundamental lemma for the Hecke algebra, transfer of (relative) characters. Most importantly, and quite surprisingly, they appear to be of abelian nature (at least, in the low-rank examples considered in this paper), even though they encompass functoriality relations of non-abelian harmonic analysis. Thus, they are amenable to application of the Poisson summation formula in order to perform the global comparison. Moreover, we show that these abelian transforms have some structure --- which presently escapes our understanding in its entirety --- as deformations of well-understood operators when the spaces under consideration are replaced by their "asymptotic cones". In this first paper we study (relative) characters for the Kunzetsov formula and the stable trace formula for $\operatorname{SL}_2$ and their degenerations (as well as for the relative trace formula for torus periods in $\operatorname{PGL}_2$), and we show how they correspond to each other under explicit transfer operators.
Langlands' functoriality principle predicts deep relations between the local and automorphic spectra of different reductive groups. This has been generalized by the relative Langlands program to include spherical varieties, among which reductive groups are special cases. In the philosophy of Langlands' "beyond endoscopy" program, these relations should be expressed as comparisons between different trace formulas, with the insertion of appropriate $L$-functions. The insertion of $L$-functions calls for one more goal to be achieved: the study of their functional equations via trace formulas. The goal of this article is to demonstrate this program through examples, indicating a local-to-global approach as in the project of endoscopy. Here, scalar transfer factors are replaced by "transfer operators" or "Hankel transforms" which are nice enough (typically, expressible in terms of usual Fourier transforms) that they can be used, in principle, to prove global comparisons (in the form of Poisson summation formulas). Some of these examples have already appeared in the literature; for others, the proofs will appear elsewhere.
Schwartz functions, or measures, are defined on any smooth semi-algebraic ("Nash") manifold, and are known to form a cosheaf for the semi-algebraic restricted topology. We extend this definition to smooth semi-algebraic stacks, which are defined as geometric stacks in the category of Nash manifolds. Moreover, when those are obtained from algebraic quotient stacks of the form X/G, with X a smooth affine variety and G a reductive group defined over a global field k, we define, whenever possible, an "evaluation map" at each semisimple k-point of the stack, without using truncation methods. This corresponds to a regularization of the sum of those orbital integrals whose semisimple part corresponds to the chosen k-point. These evaluation maps produce, in principle, a distribution which generalizes the Arthur-Selberg trace formula and Jacquet's relative trace formula, although the former, and many instances of the latter, cannot actually be defined by the purely geometric methods of this paper. In any case, the stack-theoretic point of view provides an explanation for the pure inner forms that appear in many versions of the Langlands, and relative Langlands, conjectures.
Let S(X) be the Schwartz space of compactly supported smooth functions on the p-adic points of a spherical variety X, and let C(X) be the space of Harish-Chandra Schwartz functions. Under assumptions on the spherical variety, which are satisfied when it is symmetric, we prove Paley-Wiener theorems for the two spaces, characterizing them in terms of their spectral transforms. As a corollary, we get relative analogs of the smooth and tempered Bernstein centers -- rings of multipliers for S(X) and C(X). When X= a reductive group, our theorem for C(X) specializes to the well-known theorem of Harish-Chandra, and our theorem for S(X) corresponds to a first step -- enough to recover the structure of the Bernstein center -- towards the well-known theorem of Bernstein and Heiermann.
A new approach to the Selberg trace formula, and more precisely to its spectral side, is developed. The approach relies on a notion of "Plancherel decomposition" of "asymptotically finite functions", and may generalize to obtain a general relative trace formula. This is an incomplete first version that will be complemented by an account of the invariant trace formula.
Given a spherical variety X for a group G over a non-archimedean local field k, the Plancherel decomposition for L^2(X) should be related to "distinguished" Arthur parameters into a dual group closely related to that defined by Gaitsgory and Nadler. Motivated by this, we develop, under some assumptions on the spherical variety, a Plancherel formula for L^2(X) up to discrete (modulo center) spectra of its "boundary degenerations", certain G-varieties with more symmetries which model X at infinity. Along the way, we discuss the asymptotic theory of subrepresentations of C^{infty}(X), and establish conjectures of Ichino-Ikeda and Lapid-Mao. We finally discuss global analogues of our local conjectures, concerning the period integrals of automorphic forms over spherical subgroups.
For the group G=PGL_2 we perform a comparison between two relative trace formulas: on one hand, the relative trace formula of Jacquet for the quotient T\backslash G/T, where T is a non-trivial torus, and on the other the Kuznetsov trace formula (involving Whittaker periods), applied to non-standard test functions. This gives a new proof of the celebrated result of Waldspurger on toric periods, and suggests a new way of comparing trace formulas, with some analogies to Langlands' "Beyond Endoscopy" program.
Let $X$ be a scheme of finite type over a finite field $k$, and let $\mathcal L X$ denote its arc space; in particular, $\mathcal L X(k) = X(k[[t]])$. Using the theory of Grinberg, Kazhdan, and Drinfeld on the finite-dimensionality of singularities of $\mathcal L X$ in the neighborhood of non-degenerate arcs, we show that a canonical "basic function" can be defined on the non-degenerate locus of $\mathcal L X(k)$, which corresponds to the trace of Frobenius on the stalks of the intersection complex of any finite-dimensional model. We then proceed to compute this function when $X$ is an affine toric variety or an "$L$-monoid". Our computation confirms the expectation that the basic function is a generating function for a local unramified $L$-function; in particular, in the case of an $L$-monoid we prove a conjecture formulated by the second-named author.
There are several global functionals on irreducible automorphic representations which are Eulerian, that is: pure tensors of local functionals, when the representation is written as an Euler product $π= \otimes'_v π_v$ of local representations. The precise factorization of such functionals is of interest to number theorists and is -- naturally -- very often related to special values of $L$-functions. The purpose of this paper is to develop in full generality the Plancherel formula for the Weil or oscillator representation, considered as a unitary representation of a reductive dual pair, and to use it in order to demonstrate a very general principle of Euler factorization: local factors are determined via the Langlands correspondence by a local Plancherel formula. This pattern has already been observed and conjectured in the author's prior work with Venkatesh in the case of period integrals. Here, it is shown that the Rallis inner product formula amounts to the same principle in the setting of global Howe duality.
Let H be a split reductive group over a local non-archimedean field, and let H^ denote its Langlands dual group. We present an explicit formula for the generating function of an unramified L-function associated to a highest weight representation of the dual group, considered as a series of elements in the Hecke algebra of H. This offers an alternative approach to a solution of the same problem by Wen-Wei Li. Moreover, we generalize the notion of "Satake transform" and perform the analogous calculation for a large class of spherical varieties.
Let X=H\G be a homogeneous spherical variety for a split reductive group G over the integers o of a p-adic field k, and K=G(o) a hyperspecial maximal compact subgroup of G=G(k). We compute eigenfunctions ("spherical functions") on X=X(k) under the action of the unramified (or spherical) Hecke algebra of G, generalizing many classical results of "Casselman-Shalika" type. Under some additional assumptions on X we also prove a variant of the formula which involves a certain quotient of L-values, and we present several applications such as: (1) a statement on "good test vectors" in the multiplicity-free case (namely, that an H-invariant functional on an irreducible unramified representation πis non-zero on π^K), (2) the unramified Plancherel formula for X, including a formula for the "Tamagawa measure" of X(o), and (3) a computation of the most continuous part of H-period integrals of principal Eisenstein series.