Abelian surfaces over finite fields with prescribed groups

Abstract

Let A be an abelian surface over F_q, the field of q elements. The rational points on A/\F_q form an abelian group A(\F_q) \simeq \Z/n_1\Z \times \Z/n_1 n_2 \Z \times \Z/n_1 n_2 n_3\Z \times\Z/n_1 n_2 n_3 n_4\Z. We are interested in knowing which groups of this shape actually arise as the group of points on some abelian surface over some finite field. For a fixed prime power q, a characterization of the abelian groups that occur was recently found by Rybakov. One can use this characterization to obtain a set of congruences modulo the integers $n_1, n_2, n_3, n_4$ on certain combinations of coefficients of the corresponding Weil polynomials. We use Rybakov's criterion to show that groups \Z/n_1\Z \times \Z/n_1 n_2 \Z \times \Z/n_1 n_2 n_3\Z \times\Z/n_1 n_2 n_3 n_4\Z do not occur if n_1 is very large with respect to n_2, n_2, n_4 (Theorem \ref{splitbound}), and occur with density zero in a wider range of the variables (Theorem \ref{splitbound-average}).