On projective spaces over local fields

Abstract

Let $\mathcal{P}$ be the set of points of a finite-dimensional projective space over a local field $F$, endowed with the topology $\tau$ naturally induced from the canonical topology of $F$. Intuitively, continuous incidence abelian group structures on $\mathcal{P}$ are abelian group structures on $\mathcal{P}$ preserving both the topology $\tau$ and the incidence of lines with points. We show that the real projective line is the only finite-dimensional projective space over an Archimedean local field which admits a continuous incidence abelian group structure. The latter is unique up to isomorphism of topological groups. In contrast, in the non-Archimedean case we construct continuous incidence abelian group structures in any dimension $n \in \mathbb{N}$. We show that if $n>1$ and the characteristic of $F$ does not divide $n+1$, then there are finitely many possibilities up to topological isomorphism and, in any case, countably many.