Let $X$ be a polarized abelian variety over a field $K$. Let $O$ be a ring with an involution that acts on $X$ and this action is compatible with the polarization. We prove that the natural action of $O$ on $(X times X^t)^4$ is compatible with a certain principal polarization.
We study endomorphisms of abelian varieties and their action on the l-adic Tate modules. We prove that for every endomorphism one may choose a basis of each Tate module such that the corresponding matrix has rational entries and does not depend on l.
These are notes of my lectures at the summer school Higher-dimensional geometry over finite fields in Goettingen, June--July 2007. We present a proof of Tates theorem on homomorphisms of abelian varieties over finite fields (including the $ell=p$ case) that is based on a quaternion trick. In fact, a a slightly stronger version of those theorems with finite coefficients is proven.
We deal with $g$-dimensional abelian varieties $X$ over finite fields. We prove that there is an universal constant (positive integer) $N=N(g)$ that depends only on $g$ that enjoys the following properties. If a certain self-product of $X$ carries an exotic Tate class then the self-product $X^{2N}$of $X$ also carries an exotic Tate class. This gives a positive answer to a question of Kiran Kedlaya.
A group $G$ is called Jordan if there is a positive integer $J=J_G$ such that every finite subgroup $mathcal{B}$ of $G$ contains a commutative subgroup $mathcal{A}subset mathcal{B}$ such that $mathcal{A}$ is normal in $mathcal{B}$ and the index $[mathcal{B}:mathcal{A}] le J$ (V.L. Popov). In this paper we deal with Jordaness properties of the groups $Bir(X)$ of birational automorphisms of irreducible smooth projective varieties $X$ over an algebraically closed field of characteristic zero. It is known (Yu. Prokhorov - C. Shramov) that $Bir(X)$ is Jordan if $X$ is non-uniruled. On the other hand, the second named author proved that $Bir(X)$ is not Jordan if $X$ is birational to a product of the projective line and a positive-dimensional abelian variety. We prove that $Bir(X)$ is Jordan if (uniruled) $X$ is a conic bundle over a non-uniruled variety $Y$ but is not birational to a product of $Y$ and the projective line. (Such a conic bundle exists only if $dim(Y)ge 2$.) When $Y$ is an abelian surface, this Jordaness property result gives an answer to a question of Prokhorov and Shramov.