The $\gamma$-filtration on the Witt ring of a scheme

Abstract

The K-ring of symmetric vector bundles over a scheme X, the so-called Grothendieck-Witt ring of X, can be endowed with the structure of a (special) $\lambda$-ring. The associated $\gamma$-filtration generalizes the fundamental filtration on the (Grothendieck-)Witt ring of a field and is closely related to the "classical" filtration by the kernels of the first two Stiefel-Whitney classes.

arXiv comment33 pages; changes in this version: ring structure in example 5.3 and many typos corrected, some cosmetic changes