Torsion points on isogenous abelian varieties

The Manin-Mumford conjecture, proven by Raynaud, predicted that a subvariety of an abelian variety over a field of characteristic zero contains a Zariski dense set of torsion points if and only if it is a union of torsion cosets, i.e. of translates of abelian subvarieties by torsion points. We study subvarieties of abelian schemes that contain a Zariski dense set of torsion points that lie on pairwise isogenous fibers. If the abelian scheme has maximal variation, conjectures of Zannier and Pink characterize such subvarieties. If everything is defined over the algebraic numbers, we essentially prove one half of the conclusion of these conjectures: the geometric generic fiber of an irreducible such subvariety over its projection to the base is a union of torsion cosets. Our proof is based on a strategy due to Lang, Serre, Tate, and Hindry of using Galois automorphisms that act as homotheties on the torsion points. If the abelian scheme is a fibered power of the Legendre family of elliptic curves, this method yields explicit and uniform results. It also yields uniform Manin-Mumford results within a given isogeny class.