Hilbert's Tenth Problem over Function Fields of Positive Characteristic Not Containing the Algebraic Closure of a Finite Field

Kirsten Eisentraeger, Alexandra Shlapentokh

Published 2013-06-11Version 1

We prove that the existential theory of any function field $K$ of characteristic $p> 0$ is undecidable in the language of rings provided that the constant field does not contain the algebraic closure of a finite field. We also extend the undecidability proof for function fields of higher transcendence degree to characteristic 2 and show that the first-order theory of {\bf any} function field of positive characteristic is undecidable in the language of rings without parameters.