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Etale morphisms are the formally etale morphisms locally of finite presentation
Statement
Assume the Axiom of Choice (The Axiom of Choice). A morphism of schemes is 'etale (Étale morphism of schemes) if and only if it is locally of finite presentation (Locally finite presentation morphisms) and formally 'etale (Formally etale morphism).
The formal 'etaleness convention is the one fixed in the earlier definition: formally 'etale means formally smooth and formally unramified (Formally smooth morphism, Formally unramified morphism), so that every square-zero lifting problem for admits lifts Zariski locally on the test scheme and any two such local lifts agree on the overlaps of their domains of definition; the local lifts then glue to a single lift. No flatness or finite type hypothesis is part of formal 'etaleness, and the two directions of the equivalence are proved by exhibiting the local lift from a standard smooth chart (forward) and by reducing formal smoothness to smoothness with the vanishing differentials (reverse).
Facts & Assumptions
Given: The data and hypotheses displayed in the Statement, with the conventions fixed there.
'Etale at means smooth at of relative dimension : locally of finite presentation at , flat at , and geometric regularity of the fibre at of local dimension ; is 'etale when this holds at every point, and then is locally of finite presentation (Étale morphism of schemes).
Assume AC. If is locally of finite presentation, then is 'etale at if and only if is flat at and unramified at in the sense of locally finite type plus formal unramifiedness at (Étale equals flat and unramified in finite presentation).
For an arbitrary morphism, formal unramifiedness is equivalent to the vanishing of the sheaf of relative differentials: is formally unramified if and only if , and a morphism is unramified exactly when it is locally of finite type and (Formal unramifiedness iff Omega vanishes, Unramified morphism, Sheaf of relative Kähler differentials).
is formally 'etale when it is formally smooth and formally unramified; equivalently every square-zero lifting problem has a lift Zariski locally on the test scheme and any two local lifts agree on overlaps, so that they glue to a unique global lift (Formally etale morphism, Formally smooth morphism, Formally unramified morphism).
Assume AC. A morphism is smooth if and only if it is locally of finite presentation and formally smooth (Smooth morphisms are exactly the formally smooth locally finitely presented morphisms).
A morphism is smooth at when it is locally of finite presentation at , flat at and the fibre is geometrically regular at ; in particular a smooth morphism is locally of finite presentation and flat at every point (Smooth morphism of schemes).
For a ring map , composition with the universal derivation is a bijection for every -module , so exactly when every -derivation of into every -module vanishes; on an affine chart over the sheaf is the sheaf attached to (Derivations are maps out of Ω, Universal Kähler differential module, Affine charts recover the algebraic module of differentials).
A square-zero thickening is a closed immersion with ideal sheaf satisfying (Closed immersions of schemes, Formally unramified morphism); on affine charts it is an ideal with , and two -algebra maps that agree modulo are exactly the affine form of two lifts agreeing on . Agreement of two morphisms is a condition local on the test scheme, and morphisms into a scheme agree as soon as they agree on an open cover of the test scheme.
The Axiom of Choice states that every family of nonempty sets has a choice function; it is assumed in the smooth--formally smooth equivalence and in the 'etale--flat--unramified equivalence used below (The Axiom of Choice).
Proof
Forward direction, formal smoothness. Assume 'etale. Then is locally of finite presentation and smooth at every point by [F1], hence smooth [F6]; [F5] (AC) then shows that is formally smooth.
Forward direction, vanishing differentials. Assume 'etale. At every point the morphism is locally of finite presentation, flat and unramified, the last by [F2] (AC) in the forward direction; by [F3] this means . As ranges over the sheaf of relative differentials vanishes: , and on every affine chart over the module is zero by [F7].
Reverse direction. Assume now that is locally of finite presentation and formally 'etale (AC). By [F4] is formally smooth and formally unramified; [F5] applied to the formally smooth morphism turns local finite presentation into smoothness, so is smooth, and consequently locally of finite presentation and flat at every point by [F6]. By [F3] the formal unramifiedness gives , hence is unramified at every point (it is locally of finite presentation, in particular locally of finite type); [F2] then gives that is 'etale at every point.
Forward direction, uniqueness of lifts. Let be a square-zero thickening, let be -morphisms with ; we show . Agreement is local on [F8], so fix and put (equality holds because a square-zero thickening has the same underlying space as : the underlying map of a closed immersion is injective with image the closed set where the stalk of is not the whole local ring, and a square-zero ideal has no stalk equal to the whole local ring, for that would force the local ring ). Choose affine opens around and around with ; then is an open neighbourhood of and we may replace by an affine open containing , so that correspond to -algebra maps agreeing modulo the square-zero ideal of . Define . For one computes , and since and the elements and act in the same way on , so is an -derivation of into the -module . By [F7] and the vanishing of step 1.2, , so and on ; as was arbitrary, on .
Forward direction, conclusion. By steps 1.1 and 2.1 the 'etale morphism is formally smooth (local existence of lifts) and formally unramified (uniqueness of lifts agreeing on a square-zero thickening), hence formally 'etale by [F4]; it is locally of finite presentation by [F1]. This proves the 'only if' direction.
Summary. The Axiom of Choice [F9] is assumed in the Statement and is used exactly through [F5] in steps 1.1 and 1.3 and through [F2] in steps 1.2 and 1.3; steps 2.1 and 3.1 use only the universal property of differentials and the definition of formal 'etaleness, and add no choice. [F2, F5, F9, step 1.1, step 1.2, step 1.3]
Depends on
- Étale morphism of schemes
- Étale equals flat and unramified in finite presentation
- Unramified morphism
- Formal unramifiedness iff Omega vanishes
- Formally etale morphism
- Formally smooth morphism
- Formally unramified morphism
- Smooth morphisms are exactly the formally smooth locally finitely presented morphisms
- Smooth morphism of schemes
- Locally finite presentation morphisms
- Derivations are maps out of Ω
- Universal Kähler differential module
- Affine charts recover the algebraic module of differentials
- Sheaf of relative Kähler differentials
- Closed immersions of schemes
- The Axiom of Choice
Used by
Dependency tree · two levels
58 results within two dependency steps of this one, each drawn at its shortest distance from it. An arrow runs from a result to what uses it, so the chart reads left to right and ends at this result, which carries a heavier outline. Every node is a link to that result. Click elsewhere on the chart to enlarge it.
Sources
- The Stacks Project, Morphisms of Schemes, Lemma 29.36.5 and Section 29.35 (tags 02G4, 02H9) (standard reference, not scraped)
- Ravi Vakil, The Rising Sea, 29 August 2022 public draft, Chapter 26 (etale = formally etale + locally finitely presented) (standard reference, not scraped)