The average number of subgroups of elliptic curves over finite fields

Corentin Perret-Gentil

Published 2018-11-26Version 1

By adapting the technique of David, Koukoulopoulos and Smith for computing sums of Euler products, and using their interpretation of results of Schoof \`a la Gekeler, we determine the average number of subgroups (or cyclic subgroups) of an elliptic curve over a fixed finite field of prime size. This is in line with previous works computing the average number of (cyclic) subgroups of finite abelian groups of rank at most 2. A required input is a good estimate for the divisor function in both short interval and arithmetic progressions, that we obtain by combining ideas of Ivi\'c--Zhai and Blomer.