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I am reading Fernando Gouvea's p-adic numbers an introduction. However, I am not able to figure out the above question as most of the proofs appear as exercises. Can someone please cite a good resource to study the extensions and their ramifications that is more thorough than the book I cited? I am looking for an algebraic perspective rather than an analytic one.

I have looked at the proofs for Eisenstein's polynomials giving totally ramified extensions. But I am not able to solve the above. I also know that if $f(x) \in \mathbb{Z}_p[x]$ is monic whose reduction $\mod p$ is irreducible in $\mathbb{F}_p[x]$, then $f(x)$ is irreducible over $\mathbb{Q}_p[x]$.

If you can only provide me with hints, please also cite the resources you have read to gain an understanding of this topic.

Afntu
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emmy
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  • Surely if $f$ is irreducible modulo $p$ then its discriminant is non-zero modulo $p$, and hence $p$ does not ramify in $\mathbb Q_p[x]/f(x)$. – Ferra Nov 03 '25 at 12:28
  • what is this result relating discriminant with ramification? – emmy Nov 03 '25 at 14:18
  • It's a standard result on ramification: if $p$ ramifies then it must divide the discriminant of $f(x)$. See any book on local fields, like Serre's "Corps locaux". – Ferra Nov 03 '25 at 15:16
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    Your question title makes no sense. I assume you mean $f\in \mathbb{Z}_p[x]$ whose reduction in $\mathbb{F}_p[x]$ is irreducible. Also, the field extension would be $\mathbb{Q}_p[x]/f(x)$. – Torsten Schoeneberg Nov 03 '25 at 15:30
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    Hint: being unramified means that the degree of the residue field is equal to the degree of the extension. Can you show that the residue field is $\mathbb F_p[x]/f(x)$? – Mathmo123 Nov 03 '25 at 16:18
  • @Mathmo123 how do I show this? – emmy Nov 04 '25 at 06:53
  • @TorstenSchoeneberg I meant that $f \in F_p[x]$ but can also be viewed as a polynomial in Z_p[x] – emmy Nov 04 '25 at 06:54
  • But you should not mean that because there is no "natural" way to view $f\in \mathbb{F}_p[x]$ as an element in $\mathbb Z_p[x]$, just like you should not view elements of $\mathbb F_p$ as elements of $\mathbb Z_p$. A choice of representatives intervenes. It might be that in this case, the statement would still be true for any $\hat{f} \in \mathbb Z_p[x]$ whose reduction modulo $p$ is your given $f \in \mathbb{F}_p[x]$, but one has to be careful with these things. Note how in the question body, and in the answer, we do start with an $f \in \mathbb Z_p[x]$ instead. – Torsten Schoeneberg Nov 05 '25 at 00:58

1 Answers1

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It might be useful to abstract notation a bit: we are considering some simple extension $K=\mathbb Q_p(\alpha)$ of $\mathbb Q_p$ where $\alpha\in\mathcal O_K$ has minimal polynomial $f(x)\in\mathbb Z_p[x]$ which is irreducible mod $p$. Let's call $\kappa$ the residue field of $K$. Since $\alpha\in\mathcal O_K$ we have a residue $\overline\alpha\in\kappa$. Therefore we have a tower in characteristic $p$

$$\mathbb F_p\subseteq\mathbb F_p(\overline\alpha)\subseteq\kappa.$$

But $\overline\alpha$ is a root of $\overline f(x)\in\mathbb F_p[x]$, which is irreducible, so you can conclude that $$[\mathbb F_p(\overline\alpha):\mathbb F_p]=\deg(\overline f)=\deg(f)=[K:\mathbb Q_p]$$

from which you deduce $[\kappa:\mathbb F_p]=[K:\mathbb Q_p]$ and the extension is unramified.

Edit to address the question you're making in the comment: let's write an equation for $f(\alpha)=0$, so we give $f$ some coefficients, say $f(x)=\sum_{i=0}^n c_ix^i$ where $c_i\in\mathbb Z_p$ and $c_n=1$. Then we have an equation in $\mathcal O_K$:

$$0=f(\alpha)=\sum_{i=0}^n c_i\alpha^i.$$

Now we consider this equation modulo $\mathfrak m_K$: in $\kappa$ we have

$$0=\sum_{i=0}^n(c_i+\mathfrak m_K)(\alpha+\mathfrak m_K)^i.$$

Your question (if I'm understanding correctly) is why this actually shows that $\alpha+\mathfrak m_K$ is a root of $\overline f$, the residue of $f$ modulo $p$, since above we have coefficients mod $\mathfrak m_K$. The point is simple (but the notation is ugly): the following square commutes

$$\require{AMScd} \begin{CD} \mathbb Z_p @>{i}>> \mathcal O_K\\ @VVV @VVV \\ \mathbb F_p @>{\iota}>> \kappa \end{CD}$$

and so $c_i+\mathfrak m_K=\iota(c_i+p\mathbb Z_p)$ which gives us

$$0=\sum_{i=0}^n(c_i+\mathfrak m_K)(\alpha+\mathfrak m_K)^i=\sum_{i=0}^n \iota(c_i+p\mathbb Z_p)(\alpha+\mathfrak m_K)^i=(\iota(\overline f))(\alpha+\mathfrak m_K)$$

where we write $\iota(\overline f)$ for the image of $\overline f$ under the map $\mathbb F_p[x]\to\kappa[x]$ induced by $\iota$, and we see that $\alpha+\mathfrak m_K$ is a root of $\iota(\overline f)$, then we abuse notation and say "$\alpha+\mathfrak m_K$ is a root of $\overline f$" (we are always implicitly doing this type of thing when we work with arbitrary field extensions!)

I guess the last point is why the square commutes: this is really just unraveling what it means to consider $\kappa/\mathbb F_p$ as an extension in the first place; the way we say this is an extension is by having a homomorphism $\mathbb F_p\to\kappa$, and the most concrete way to get this homomorphism is to consider the composition $\mathbb Z_p\to\mathcal O_K\to\kappa$, and notice that this map kills $p$ (since $p\in\mathfrak m_K$) and therefore it factors through a map on the quotient $\iota:\mathbb F_p=\mathbb Z_p/(p)\to\kappa$.

TY Mathers
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  • Just verifying : 1) \alpha is in O_k because its valuation is zero. 2) why is \bar \alpha a root of \bar f? – emmy Nov 05 '25 at 05:28
  • I mean, we are taking module the maximal ideal in O_k of the coefficients of f(x). How is this the same as taking mod p? – emmy Nov 05 '25 at 05:36
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    @emmy at the cost of horrendous notation I've spelled this point out more clearly; let me know if I misunderstood the concern – TY Mathers Nov 05 '25 at 08:29
  • Thanks for the answer! I am assuming that that map fron $\mathbb{Z}_p \to O_K$ and $\mathbb{F}_p\to \kay$ (residue field) are both inclusion maps ? – emmy Nov 16 '25 at 12:55
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    @emmy Yes that's correct! – TY Mathers Nov 17 '25 at 02:42