Around the Thom-Sebastiani theorem
By Luc Illusie
Appears in collection : Journées de géométrie arithmétique de l'IHÉS
For germs of holomorphic functions $f : (\mathbf{C}^{m+1},0) \to (\mathbf{C},0)$, $g : (\mathbf{C}^{n+1},0) \to (\mathbf{C},0)$ having an isolated critical point at 0 with value 0, the classical Thom-Sebastiani theorem describes the vanishing cycles group $\Phi^{m+n+1}(f \oplus g)$ (and its monodromy) as a tensor product $\Phi^m(f) \otimes \Phi^n(g)$, where $(f\oplus g)(x,y) = f(x) + g(y), x = (x_0,...,x_m), y = (y_0,...,y_n)$. I will discuss algebraic variants and generalizations of this result over fields of any characteristic, where the tensor product is replaced by a certain local convolution product, as suggested by Deligne. The main theorem is a Künneth formula for $R\Psi$ in the framework of Deligne's theory of nearby cycles over general bases.