Colloquium publications / American Mathematical Society,
vol. 44
0065-9258 ;
Includes exercises and notes at chapter ends, bibliographical references (pages 573-588) and indexes.
Preface [in French] by Jacques Tits.
Involutions and Hermitian forms -- Invariants of involutions -- Similitudes -- Algebras of degree four -- Algebras of degree three -- Algebraic groups -- Galois cohomology -- Composition and triality -- Cubic Jordan algebras -- Trialitarian central simple algebras.
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This monograph is an exposition of the theory of central simple algebras with involution, in relation to linear algebraic groups. It provides the algebra-theoretic foundations for much of the recent work on linear algebraic groups over arbitrary fields. Involutions are viewed as twisted forms of (hermitian) quadrics, leading to new developments on the model of the algebraic theory of quadratic forms. In addition to classical groups, phenomena related to triality are also discussed, as well as groups of type F₄ or G₂ arising from exceptional Jordan or composition algebras.