The local converse theorem for odd special orthogonal and symplectic groups in positive characteristic

Abstract: Let $F$ be a non-archimedean local field of characteristic different from $2$ and $G$ be either an odd special orthogonal group ${\rm SO}{2r+1}(F)$ or a symplectic group ${\rm Sp}{2r}(F)$. In this paper, we establish the local converse theorem for $G$. Namely, for given two irreducible admissible generic representations of $G$ with the same central character, if they have the same local gamma factors twisted by irreducible supercuspidal representations of ${\rm GL}_n(F)$ for all $1 \leq n \leq r$ with the same additive character, these representations are isomorphic. Using the theory of Cogdell, Shahidi, and Tsai on partial Bessel functions and the classification of irreducible generic representations, we break the barrier on the rank of twists $1 \leq n \leq 2r-1$ in the work of Jiang and Soudry, and extend the result of Q. Zhang, which was achieved for all supercuspidal representations in characteristic $0$.