English

Eisenstein series modulo prime powers

Number Theory 2025-12-17 v2

Abstract

If p5p\geq 5 is prime and k4k\geq 4 is an even integer with (p1)k(p-1)\nmid k we consider the Eisenstein series GkG_k on SL2(Z)\operatorname{SL}_2(\mathbb{Z}) modulo powers of pp. It is classically known that for such kk we have GkGk(modp)G_k\equiv G_{k'}\pmod p if kk(modp1)k\equiv k'\pmod{p-1}. Here we obtain a generalization modulo prime powers pmp^m by giving an expression for Gk(modpm)G_k\pmod{p^m} in terms of modular forms of weight at most mpmp. As an application we extend a recent result of the first author with Hanson, Raum and Richter by showing that, modulo powers of Ep1E_{p-1}, every such Eisenstein series is congruent modulo pmp^m to a modular form of weight at most mpmp. We prove a similar result for the normalized Eisenstein series EkE_k in the case that (p1)k(p-1)\mid k and m<pm<p.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2509.02427,
  title  = {Eisenstein series modulo prime powers},
  author = {Scott Ahlgren and Cruz Castillo and Clayton Williams},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2509.02427},
  year   = {2025}
}
R2 v1 2026-07-01T05:17:33.618Z