Quasi-algebraically closed field
In mathematics, a field F is called quasi-algebraically closed (or C1) if every non-constant homogeneous polynomial P over F has a non-trivial zero provided the number of its variables is more than its degree. The idea of quasi-algebraically closed fields was investigated by C. C. Tsen, a student of Emmy Noether, in a 1936 paper (Tsen 1936); and later by Serge Lang in his 1951 Princeton University dissertation and in his 1952 paper (Lang 1952). The idea itself is attributed to Lang's advisor Emil Artin.
Formally, if P is a non-constant homogeneous polynomial in variables
- X1, ..., XN,
and of degree d satisfying
- d < N
then it has a non-trivial zero over F; that is, for some xi in F, not all 0, we have
- P(x1, ..., xN) = 0.
In geometric language, the hypersurface defined by P, in projective space of degree N − 2, then has a point over F.