Asymptotic distribution for pairs of linear and quadratic forms at integral vectors

Abstract

We study the joint distribution of values of a pair consisting of a quadratic form $q$ and a linear form $\mathbf l$ over the set of integral vectors, a problem initiated by Dani-Margulis (1989). In the spirit of the celebrated theorem of Eskin, Margulis and Mozes on the quantitative version of the Oppenheim conjecture, we show that if $n \ge 5$ then under the assumptions that for every $(\alpha, \beta ) \in \mathbb R^2 \setminus \{ (0,0) \}$, the form $\alpha q + \beta \mathbf l^2$ is irrational and that the signature of the restriction of $q$ to the kernel of $\mathbf l$ is $(p, n-1-p)$, where $3\le p \le n-2$, the number of vectors $v \in \mathbb Z^n$ for which $\|v\| < T$, $a < q(v) < b$ and $c< \mathbf l(v) < d$ is asymptotically $$ C(q, \mathbf l)(d-c)(b-a)T^{n-3} , $$ as $T \to \infty$, where $C(q, \mathbf l)$ only depends on $q$ and $\mathbf l$. The density of the set of joint values of $(q, \mathbf l)$ under the same assumptions is shown by Gorodnik (2004).