Geometric construction of modular polynomials with level structures

Abstract

The classical modular polynomial for $j$-invariants describes the relation between two elliptic curves connected by isogenies. This polynomial has been applied to various algorithms in computational number theory, such as point counting on elliptic curves. In addition, computing the modular polynomial itself is also an important problem, and various algorithms to compute it have been proposed. On the other hand, modular polynomials for other invariants of higher level structures have also been studied. For example, the modular polynomials for the Legendre $λ$-invariant and the Weber functions are well-known. In this paper, we give another approach to construct modular polynomials of higher level purely algebraically. In particular, we show the existence of modular polynomials for invariants directly related to models of elliptic curves, such as the coefficients of Montgomery and Hessian curves. We also show that these modular polynomials have integer coefficients and are symmetric and irreducible in certain cases, and give an algorithm to compute them, which is based on the deformation method by Kunzweiler and Robert.