Irreducible admissible mod-p representations of metaplectic groups

Abstract

Let p be an odd prime number, and F a nonarchimedean local field of residual characteristic p. We classify the smooth, irreducible, admissible genuine mod-p representations of the twofold metaplectic cover $$\widetilde{\text {Sp}}_{2n}(F)$$ of $$\text {Sp}_{2n}(F)$$ in terms of genuine supercuspidal (equivalently, supersingular) representations of Levi subgroups. To do so, we use results of Henniart–Vigneras as well as new technical results to adapt Herzig’s method to the metaplectic setting. As consequences, we obtain an irreducibility criterion for principal series representations generalizing the complete irreducibility of principal series representations in the rank 1 case, as well as the fact that irreducibility is preserved by parabolic induction from the cover of the Siegel Levi subgroup.