We prove a Tannakian form of Drinfeld's lemma for isocrystals on a variety over a finite field, equipped with actions of partial Frobenius operators. This provides an intermediate step towards transferring V. Lafforgue's work on the Langlands correspondence over function fields from $\ell$-adic to $p$-adic coefficients. We also discuss a motivic variant and a local variant of Drinfeld's lemma.

In this article we prove exactness of the homotopy sequence of overconvergent fundamental groups for a smooth and projective morphism in characteristic p. We do so by first proving a corresponding result for rigid analytic varieties in characteristic $0$, following dos Santos [dS15] in the algebraic case. In characteristic p, we then proceed by a series of reductions to the case of a liftable family of curves, where we can apply the rigid analytic result. We then use this to deduce a Lefschetz hyperplane theorem for convergent fundamental groups, as well as a comparison theorem with the étale fundamental group.

Let 𝒱 be a mixed characteristic complete discrete valuation ring with perfect residue field k. We solve Berthelot’s conjectures on the stability of the holonomicity over smooth projective formal 𝒱-schemes. Then we build a category of F-complexes of arithmetic 𝒟-modules over quasi-projective k-varieties with bounded and holonomic cohomology. We obtain its stability under Grothendieck’s six operations.

We complete our proof that given an overconvergent F-isocrystal on a variety over a field of positive characteristic, one can pull back along a suitable generically finite cover to obtain an isocrystal which extends, with logarithmic singularities and nilpotent residues, to some complete variety. We also establish an analogue for F-isocrystals overconvergent inside a partial compactification. By previous results, this reduces to solving a local problem in a neighborhood of a valuation of height 1 and residual transcendence degree zero. We do this by studying the variation of some numerical invariants attached to p-adic differential modules, analogous to the irregularity of a complex meromorphic connection. This allows for an induction on the transcendence defect of the valuation, i.e., the discrepancy between the dimension of the variety and the rational rank of the valuation.

Using a local construction from a previous paper, we exhibit a numerical invariant, the differential Swan conductor, for an isocrystal on a variety over a perfect field of positive characteristic overconvergent along a boundary divisor; this leads to an analogous construction for certain p-adic and l-adic representations of the étale fundamental group of a variety. We then demonstrate some variational properties of this definition for overconvergent isocrystals, paying special attention to the case of surfaces.

We resolve the local semistable reduction problem for overconvergent F-isocrystals at monomial valuations (Abhyankar valuations of height 1 and residue transcendence degree zero). We first introduce a higher-dimensional analogue of the generic radius of convergence for a p-adic differential module, which obeys a convexity property. We then combine this convexity property with a form of the p-adic local monodromy theorem for so-called fake annuli.

We introduce a valuation-theoretic approach to the problem of semistable reduction (i.e. existence of logarithmic extensions on suitable covers) of overconvergent isocrystals with Frobenius structure. The key tool is the quasicompactness of the Riemann–Zariski space associated to the function field of a variety. We also make some initial reductions, which allow attention to be focused on valuations of height 1 and transcendence degree 0.

Let $X$ be a smooth variety over a field $k$ of characteristic $p>0$, and let $\mathcal{E}$ be an overconvergent isocrystal on $X$. We establish a criterion for the existence of a ‘canonical logarithmic extension’ of $\mathcal{E}$ to a smooth compactification $\overline{X}$ of $X$ whose complement is a strict normal crossings divisor. We also obtain some related results, including a form of Zariski–Nagata purity for isocrystals.