ON THE ZEROES OF MULTIVARIABLE POLYNOMIALS

OVER AN INTEGRAL DOMAIN

E. F. Cornelius, Jr., PhD, JD
Professor Igor Germanovich Korepanov of the Moscow Aviation Institute,
Moscow, posed the following question: "Can a complicated algebraic function be
proved to be identical zero, based on a reasonable number of its zero values for
some tuples of arguments?" https://www.researchgate.net/post/ Can_a_com plicated_algebraic_function_be_proved_to_be_identical_zero_based_on_
a_reasonable_number_of_its_zero_values_for_some_tuples_of_arguments.
A special case of this issue for multivariable polynomials over the integers was
addressed in "Multinomial Points", Houston J Math, Vol 34, No 3 (2008), pp
661-676, which is posted at https://www.scribd.com/document/85492144/Multinomial-Points. That paper was penned by the author and Professor Phill
Schultz of the University of Western Australia, Perth.
The purpose of this note is to demonstrate that a generalization of Proposition 3.1 from "Multinomial Points" holds for multivariable polynomials over
integral domains. In an eort to get to the point as expediciously, the reader is
referred to the notation on pp 663-665, which is used analogously below.
D an integral domain
C(k; D) set of all k-tuples of elements of D (commonly denoted Dk )
S(n) a set of n distinct elements of D
C(k; n) the set of all k-tuples of elements from S(n) (order of C(k; n) = nk )
D[Xk ] polynomials in k variables with coe ents in D
D[Xk ]n polynomials of maximum degree < n
Theorem. Let D be an integral domain. Let f (Xk ) 2 D[Xk ]n . If f (C(k; n))
= 0, then f is the zero function.
Proof : The theorem certainly is true for k = 1, since the only polynomial
in D[x]n which has n zeroes is 0 itself. Thus assume the truth for some k 1
and for k + 1 express f 2 D[Xk+1 ]n in the form of an element of (D[Xk ]n )[xk ]n ,
Pn 1
f (Xk+1 ) = i=0 gi (Xk )xik , where gi (Xk ) 2 D[Xk ]n . For (ai0 ; ai1 ; : : : ; aik 1 ; ajk )
Pn 1
2 C(k + 1; n), f ((ai0 ; ai1 ; : : : ; aik 1 ); ajk ) = i=0 gi (ai0 ; ai1 ; : : : ; aik 1 )aijk =
0, j = 0; 1; : : : ; n 1. For each k-tuple (ai0 ; ai1 ; : : : ; aik 1 ), f may be viewed as
a polynomial in xk of degree < n with n zeroes. Since D and D[Xk ]n are integral
domains, the coe cients gi (ai0 ; ai1 ; : : : ; aik 1 ) all must be 0. Since this holds
for all (ai0 ; ai1 ; : : : ; aik 1 ), all of the gi must be 0 by the induction hypothesis.
Hence f itself is 0:
COMMENT. In particular the theorem holds for Q (the rationals), R (the
real numbers), and C (the complex numbers).