On unit root formulas for toric exponential sums

Abstract

Starting from a classical generating series for Bessel functions due to Schlomilch, we use Dwork's relative dual theory to broadly generalize unit-root results of Dwork on Kloosterman sums and Sperber on hyperkloosterman sums. In particular, we express the (unique) p-adic unit root of an arbitrary exponential sum on the torus in terms of special values of the p-adic analytic continuation of a ratio of A-hypergeometric functions. In contrast with the earlier works, we use noncohomological methods and obtain results that are valid for arbitrary exponential sums without any hypothesis of nondegeneracy.