English

Root number bias for newforms

Number Theory 2025-10-31 v3

Abstract

Previously we observed that newforms obey a strict bias towards root number +1+1 in squarefree levels: at least half of the newforms in Sk(Γ0(N))S_k(\Gamma_0(N)) with root number +1+1 for NN squarefree, and it is strictly more than half outside of a few special cases. Subsequently, other authors treated levels which are cubes of squarefree numbers. Here we treat arbitrary levels, and find that if the level is not the square of a squarefree number, this strict bias still holds for any weight. In fact the number of such exceptional levels is finite for fixed weight, and 0 if k<12k < 12. We also investigate some variants of this question to better understand the exceptional levels.

Cite

@article{arxiv.2207.08121,
  title  = {Root number bias for newforms},
  author = {Kimball Martin},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2207.08121},
  year   = {2025}
}

Comments

16 pages; this version corrects a mathematical misprint in the published version

R2 v1 2026-06-25T00:58:55.698Z