A-NEW-LOOK-AT-HECKE’S-INDEFINITE-THETA-SERIES.pdfVIP

A NEW LOOK AT HECKE’S INDEFINITE THETA SERIES A. POLISHCHUK This note is devoted to the q-series of the form f (m, n)qQ(m,n) − f (m, n)qQ(m,n) m≥0,n≥0 m0,n0 2 where Q is an indefinite quadratic form on Z , f (m, n) is a doubly periodic function on Z2 such that the sums of f (m, n)qQ(m,n) over all vertical and all horizontal lines in Z2 vanish. Some of these series appeared as coefficients in univalued triple Massey products on elliptic curves computed via homological mirror symmetry in [3]. In particular, in this context the condition of vanishing of sums over vertical and horizontal lines appears to be related to the standard necessary condition of the existence of triple Massey products (the vanishing of two double products). In the present paper we generalize Theorem 3 of [3] which relates such series to the indefinite theta series considered by Hecke in [1], [2] (our approach is completely elementary and doesn’t use the connection with triple products on elliptic curves). The main consequence of this relation is the modularity of our q-series. We also show that the problem of finding all linear relations between our series is related 2 to the study of orbits of actions of dihedral groups on (Z/N Z) . 1. Main result 1.1. Hecke’s indefinite theta series. Let us recall the definition of these series. Let K be a totally real quadratic extension of Q, i.e. K is either a field of the form Q(√D) (where D 0) or the algebra Q ⊕ Q. We have the norm map Nm : K → Q (in case of Q ⊕ Q this is the product of components). Let us denote by C ⊂ K the