Representations of binary quadratic forms by quaternary quadratic forms

Abstract

We prove a local-global principle for primitive representations of binary quadratic forms by quaternary quadratic forms. Our method is a variant of Linnik's ergodic method showing density for certain homogenous toral sets. The central ingredient is a measure classification result of Einsiedler and Lindenstrauss for actions of rank two diagonalizable groups on quotients of products of $\mathrm{SL}_2$. This rigidity result together with an application of the Siegel mass formula reduces the density problem to a counting problem on a certain affine variety. We solve that counting problem using the determinant method of Bombieri-Pila and Heath-Brown.