Abstract

An invariant for symplectic involutions on central simple algebras of degree divisible by 4 over fields of characteristic different from 2 is defined on the basis of Rost’s cohomological invariant of degree 3 for torsors under symplectic groups. We relate this invariant to trace forms and show how its triviality yields a decomposability criterion for algebras of degree 8 with symplectic involution.

Authors