We prove that the class of all the rings $\mathbb {Z}/m\mathbb {Z}$ for all $m>1$ is decidable. This gives a positive solution to a problem of Ax asked in his celebrated 1968 paper on the elementary theory of finite fields [1, Problem 5, p. 270]. In our proof, we reduce the problem to the decidability of the ring of adeles $\mathbb {A}_{\mathbb {Q}}$ of $\mathbb {Q}$.

We show that the image of the adelic Galois representation attached to a non-CM modular form is open in the adelic points of a suitable algebraic subgroup of GL2 (defined by F. Momose). We also show a similar result for the adelic Galois representation attached to a finite set of modular forms.

Cuntz and Li have defined a C*-algebra associated to any integral domain, using generators and relations, and proved that it is simple and purely infinite and that it is stably isomorphic to a crossed product of a commutative C*-algebra. We give an approach to a class of C*-algebras containing those studied by Cuntz and Li, using the general theory of C*-dynamical systems associated to certain semidirect product groups. Even for the special case of the Cuntz–Li algebras, our development is new.

In this paper we compute and continue meromorphically to the entire complex plane the zeta functions of twisted quaternionic Shimura varieties of dimension 3. The twist of the quaternionic Shimura varieties is done by a mod ℘ representation of the absolute Galois group.