Hermitian vector bundles and extension groups on arithmetic schemes. I. Geometry of numbers

We define and investigate extension groups in the context of Arakelov geometry. The “arithmetic extension groups” we introduce are extensions by groups of analytic types of the usual extension groups attached to OX-modules F and G over an arithmetic scheme X. In this paper, we focus on the first arithmetic extension group – the elements of which may be described in terms of admissible short exact sequences of hermitian vector bundles over X – and we especially consider the case when X is an “arithmetic curve”, namely the spectrum SpecOK of the ring of integers in some number field K. Then the study of arithmetic extensions over X is related to old and new problems concerning lattices and the geometry of numbers.Namely, for any two hermitian vector bundles and over X:=SpecOK, we attach a logarithmic size to any element α of , and we give an upper bound on in terms of slope invariants of and . We further illustrate this notion by relating the sizes of restrictions to points in P1(Z) of the universal extension over to the geometry of PSL2(Z) acting on Poincaré's upper half-plane, and by deducing some quantitative results in reduction theory from our previous upper bound on sizes. Finally, we investigate the behaviour of size by base change (i.e., under extension of the ground field K to a larger number field K′): when the base field K is Q, we establish that the size, which cannot increase under base change, is actually invariant when the field K′ is an abelian extension of K, or when is a direct sum of root lattices and of lattices of Voronoi's first kind.The appendices contain results concerning extensions in categories of sheaves on ringed spaces, and lattices of Voronoi's first kind which might also be of independent interest.