Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 November 2018
Let $E/F$ be a quadratic extension of number fields. In this paper, we show that the genus formula for Hilbert kernels, proved by M. Kolster and A. Movahhedi, gives the 2-rank of the Hilbert kernel of
$E$ provided that the 2-primary Hilbert kernel of
$F$ is trivial. However, since the original genus formula is not explicit enough in a very particular case, we first develop a refinement of this formula in order to employ it in the calculation of the 2-rank of
$E$ whenever
$F$ is totally real with trivial 2-primary Hilbert kernel. Finally, we apply our results to quadratic, bi-quadratic, and tri-quadratic fields which include a complete 2-rank formula for the family of fields
$\mathbb{Q}(\sqrt{2},\sqrt{\delta )}$ where
$\delta $ is a squarefree integer.