The local-global principle for symmetric determinantal representations of smooth plane curves in characteristic two

Abstract

We give an application of Mumford's theory of canonical theta characteristics to a Diophantine problem in characteristic two. We prove that a smooth plane curve over a global field of characteristic two is defined by the determinant of a symmetric matrix with entries in linear forms in three variables if and only if such a symmetric determinantal representation exists everywhere locally. It is a special feature in characteristic two because analogous results are not true in other characteristics.