The Diametric Theorem in Hamming Spaces—Optimal Anticodes

For a Hamming space (ⁿ_α, d_H), the set ofn-length words over the alphabet _α = {0, 1,…,α − 1} endowed with the distanced_H, which for two wordsxⁿ = (x₁,…,x_n),yⁿ = (y₁,…,y_n) ∈ ⁿ_αcounts the number of different components, we determine the maximal cardinality of subsets with a prescribed diameterdor, in another language, anticodes with distanced. We refer to the result as the diametric theorem.In a sense anticodes are dual to codes, which have a prescribedlowerbound on the pairwise distance. It is a hopeless task to determine their maximal sizes exactly.We find it remarkable that the diametric theorem (for arbitrary α) can be derived from our recent complete intersection theorem, which can be viewed as a diametric theorem (for α = 2) in the restricted case, where alln-length words considered have exactlykones.     

Bitableaux Bases for the Diagonally Invariant Polynomial Quotient Rings

LetR=Q[x₁, x₂, …, x_n,y₁, y₂, …, y_n,z₁, …, z_n,w₁, …, w_n], letR^S_n={P∈R:σP=P∀σ∈S_n} and letμandνbe hook shape partitions ofn. WithΔ_μ(X, Y) andΔ_ν(Z, W) being appropriately defined determinants, ∂_xibeing the partial derivative operator with respect tox_iandP(∂)=P(∂_x1, …, ∂_xn, ∂_y1, …, ∂_wn), define _{μ, ν}={P∈R^S_n:P(∂)Δ_μ(X, Y)Δ_ν(Z, W)=0}. A basis is constructed for the polynomial quotient ringR^S_n/_{μ, ν}that is indexed by pairs of standard tableaux. The Hilbert series ofR^S_n/_{μ, ν}is related to the Macdonaldq, t-Kostka coefficients.     

Bivariate Hermite Interpolation and Numerical Curves

In this paper, Hermite interpolation by bivariate algebraic polynomials of total degree ?nis considered. The interpolation parameters are the values of a function and its partial derivatives up to some ordern_ν−1 at the nodesz_ν=(x_ν, y_ν),ν=1, …, s, wheren_νis the multiplicity ofz_ν. The sequence ={n₁, …, n_s; n} of multiplicities associated with the degree of interpolating polynomials is investigated. Some results of the paper were announced in [GHS93].     

Walking in circles

Consider the unit circle S¹ with distance function d measured along the circle. We show that for every selection of 2n points x₁,…,x_n,y₁,…,y_n∈S¹ there exists i∈{1,…,n} such that . We also discuss a game theoretic interpretation of this result.     

The higher-order Picone identity and comparison of half-linear differential equations of even order

An identity of the Picone type for higher-order half-linear ordinary differential operators of the form and where p_j and P_j, j=0,…,n, are continuous functions defined on [a,b] and , is derived and then the Sturmian comparison theory for the corresponding 2nth-order equations l_α[x]=0 and L_α[y]=0 based on this identity is developed.     

Monotonicity of zeros of Laguerre polynomials

Denote by x_nk(α), k=1,…,n, the zeros of the Laguerre polynomial . We establish monotonicity with respect to the parameter α of certain functions involving x_nk(α). As a consequence we obtain sharp upper bounds for the largest zero of .     

A note on feebly continuous functions

A function f from to is said to be feebly continuous at a point (x,y) if there exist sequences x_nx and y_ny with lim_n→∞lim_m→∞f(x_n,y_m)=f(x,y). Dales asked if every function has a point of feeble continuity. Our aim in this short note is to show that (assuming the Continuum Hypothesis) the answer is ‘no’. Dales also asked what happens for functions taking only two values: we show that in this case the answer is ‘yes’.     

Variation of parameters and solutions of composite products of linear differential equations

Given a basis of solutions to k ordinary linear differential equations ?j[y]=0(j=1,2,…,k), we show how Green's functions can be used to construct a basis of solutions to the homogeneous differential equation ?[y]=0, where ? is the composite product ?=?₁?₂…?k. The construction of these solutions is elementary and classical. In particular, we consider the special case when . Remarkably, in this case, if {y₁,y₂,…,yn} is a basis of ?₁[y]=0, then our method produces a basis of for any k∈N. We illustrate our results with several classical differential equations and their special function solutions.     

Remarks on some completely monotonic functions

Applying the Euler-Maclaurin summation formula, we obtain upper and lower polynomial bounds for the function , x>0, with coefficients the Bernoulli numbers Bk. This enables us to give simpler proofs of some results of H. Alzer and F. Qi et al., concerning complete monotonicity of certain functions involving the gamma function Γ(x), the psi function ψ(x) and the polygamma functions ψ(n)(x), n=1,2,… .     

Determination of means by invariance

If M is a mean on and M(f(x₁),f(x₂),…,f(xn))=f(M(x₁,x₂,…,xn)) then we say that M is invariant under f. The problem is to find a class of functions that by invariance determines a mean uniquely. We focus on the geometric mean, which can be transformed to obtain results for other means.     

On the range of a covering function

Let be a finite system of residue classes with the moduli n₁,…,n_k distinct. By means of algebraic integers we show that the range of the covering function is not contained in any residue class with modulus greater one. In particular, the values of w(x) cannot have the same parity.     

The two-dimensional Prouhet-Tarry-Escott problem

In this paper we generalize the Prouhet-Tarry-Escott problem (PTE) to any dimension. The one-dimensional PTE problem is the classical PTE problem. We concentrate on the two-dimensional version which asks, given parameters n,k∈N, for two different multi-sets {(x₁,y₁),…,(xn,yn)}, of points from Z² such that for all d,j∈{0,…,k} with j?d. We present parametric solutions for n∈{2,3,4,6} with optimal size, i.e., with k=n−1. We show that these solutions come from convex 2n-gons with all vertices in Z² such that every line parallel to a side contains an even number of vertices and prove that such convex 2n-gons do not exist for other values of n. Furthermore we show that solutions to the two-dimensional PTE problem yield solutions to the one-dimensional PTE problem. Finally, we address the PTE problem over the Gaussian integers.     

On the geometry of generalized quadrics

Let {f₀,…,f_n;g₀,…,g_n} be a sequence of homogeneous polynomials in 2n+2 variables with no common zeros in P²ⁿ⁺¹ and suppose that the degrees of the polynomials are such that is a homogeneous polynomial. We shall refer to the hypersurface X defined by Q as a generalized quadric. In this note, we prove that generalized quadrics in for n≥1 are reduced.     

Borel-plus-powers monomial ideals

Let S=K[x₁,…,x_n] be a standard graded polynomial ring over a field K. In this paper, we show that the lex-plus-powers ideal has the largest graded Betti numbers among all Borel-plus-powers monomial ideals with the same Hilbert function. In addition in the case of characteristic 0, by using this result, we prove the lex-plus-powers conjecture for graded ideals containing , where p is a prime number.     

Mapping properties for oscillatory integrals in d-dimensions

For aj,bj?1, j=1,2,…,d, we prove that the operator maps into itself for , where , and k(x,y)=φ(x,y)eig(x,y), φ(x,y) satisfies (1.2) (e.g. φ(x,y)=|x−y|^iτ,τ real) and the phase g(x,y)=xa⋅yb. We study operators with more general phases and for these operators we require that aj,bj>1, j=1,2,…,d, or al=bl?1 for some l∈{1,2,…,d}.     

Stability of plane Couette flows with respect to small periodic perturbations

We consider the plane Couette flow v₀=(x_n,0,…,0) in the infinite layer domain , where n≥2 is an integer. The exponential stability of v₀ in Lⁿ is shown under the condition that the initial perturbation is periodic in (x₁,…,x_n−1) and sufficiently small in the Lⁿ-norm.     

Polynomial sequences of bounded operators

The basic results of spectral theory are obtained using the sequence of powers of a bounded linear operator T,T²,…,Tⁿ,…. In this paper, we replace the powers Tⁿ by certain polynomials p_n(T), and make use of special properties of the polynomial sequence to derive some new results concerning operators. For example, using an arbitrary polynomial sequence , we obtain “binomial” spectral radii and semidistances, which reduce, in the case of the sequence of powers, to the usual spectral radius and semidistance.     

Noncommutative plurisubharmonic polynomials part I: Global assumptions

We consider symmetric polynomials, p, in the noncommutative (nc) free variables {x₁,x₂,…,xg}. We define the nc complex hessian of p as the second directional derivative (replacing xT by y)

     

Divisibility of matrices associated with multiplicative functions

Let S={x₁,…,x_n} be a set of n distinct positive integers. For x,y∈S and y<x, we say the y is a greatest-type divisor of x in S if y∣x and it can be deduced that z=y from y∣z,z∣x,z<x and z∈S. For x∈S, let G_S(x) denote the set of all greatest-type divisors of x in S. For any arithmetic function f, let (f(x_i,x_j)) denote the n×n matrix having f evaluated at the greatest common divisor (x_i,x_j) of x_i and x_j as its i,j-entry and let (f[x_i,x_j]) denote the n×n matrix having f evaluated at the least common multiple [x_i,x_j] of x_i and x_j as its i,j-entry. In this paper, we assume that S is a gcd-closed set and . We show that if f is a multiplicative function such that (f∗μ)(d)∈Z whenever and f(a)|f(b) whenever a|b and a,b∈S and (f(x_i,x_j)) is nonsingular, then the matrix (f(x_i,x_j)) divides the matrix (f[x_i,x_j]) in the ring M_n(Z) of n×n matrices over the integers. As a consequence, we show that (f(x_i,x_j)) divides (f[x_i,x_j]) in the ring M_n(Z) if (f∗μ)(d)∈Z whenever and f is a completely multiplicative function such that (f(x_i,x_j)) is nonsingular. This confirms a conjecture of Hong raised in 2004.