Motivic complexes and special values of zeta functions

Abstract: Beginning with the conjecture of Artin and Tate in 1966, there has been a series of successively more general conjectures expressing the special values of the zeta function of an algebraic variety over a finite field in terms of other invariants of the variety. In this article, we present the ultimate such conjecture, and provide evidence for it. In particular, we enhance Voevodsky's Z[1/p]-category of etale motivic complexes with a p-integral structure, and show that, for this category, our conjecture follows from the Tate and Beilinson conjectures. As the conjecture is stated in terms of motivic complexes, it (potentially) applies also to algebraic stacks, log varieties, simplicial varieties, etc..