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To begin the study of data structures, I demonstrate the usefulness of even quite simple structures by working through a detailed motivating example. We shall afterward come back to the basics and build up our body of knowledge incrementally.
The algorithm presented in this introduction is due to R. S. Boyer and J S. Moore and solves the string matching problem in a surprisingly efficient way. The techniques, although sophisticated, do not require any advanced mathematical tools for their understanding. It is precisely because of this simplicity that the algorithm is a good example of the usefulness of data structures, even the simplest ones. In fact, all that is needed to make the algorithm work are two small arrays storing integers.
There are two sorts of algorithms that, when first encountered, inspire both perplexity and admiration. The first is an algorithm so complicated that one can hardly imagine how its inventors came up with the idea, triggering a reaction of the kind, “How could they think of that?” The other possibility is just the opposite – some flash of ingeniousity that gives an utterly simple solution, leaving us with the question, “How didn't I think of that?” The Boyer–Moore algorithm is of this second kind.
We encounter on a daily basis instances of the string matching problem, defined generically as follows: given a text T = T[1]T[2] · · · T[n] of length n characters and a string S = S[1]S[2] · · · S[m] of length m, find the (first, or all) location(s) of S in T, if one appears there at all. In the example of Figure 1.1, the string S = TRYME is indeed found in T, starting at position 22.
To solve the problem, we imagine that the string is aligned underneath the text, starting with both text and string left justified. One can then compare corresponding characters, until a mismatch is found, which enables us to move the string forward to a new potential matching position. We call this the naive approach. It should be emphasized that our discourse of moving the pattern along an imaginary sliding path is just for facilitating understanding.
Euler noted the relation $6^{3}\,=\,3^{3}+4^{3}+5^{3}$ and asked for other instances of cubes that are sums of consecutive cubes. Similar problems have been studied by Cunningham, Catalan, Gennochi, Lucas, Pagliani, Cassels, Uchiyama, Stroeker and Zhongfeng Zhang. In particular, Stroeker determined all squares that can be written as a sum of at most 50 consecutive cubes. We generalize Stroeker’s work by determining all perfect powers that are sums of at most 50 consecutive cubes. Our methods include descent, linear forms in two logarithms and Frey–Hellegouarch curves.
Let $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$ be an arithmetic function and let ${\mathcal{B}}$ be the set of positive integers $n=p_{1}^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{1}}\cdots p_{k}^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{k}}$ which satisfy $p_{j+1}\leqslant \unicode[STIX]{x1D703}(p_{1}^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{1}}\cdots p_{j}^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{j}})$ for $0\leqslant j<k$. We show that ${\mathcal{B}}$ has a natural density, provide a criterion to determine whether this density is positive, and give various estimates for the counting function of ${\mathcal{B}}$. When $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}(n)/n$ is non-decreasing, the set ${\mathcal{B}}$ coincides with the set of integers $n$ whose divisors $1=d_{1}<d_{2}<\cdots <d_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D70F}(n)}=n$ satisfy $d_{j+1}\leqslant \unicode[STIX]{x1D703}(d_{j})$ for $1\leqslant j<\unicode[STIX]{x1D70F}(n)$.
Assuming the Riemann Hypothesis, Soundararajan [Ann. of Math. (2) 170 (2009), 981–993] showed that $\int _{0}^{T}|\unicode[STIX]{x1D701}(1/2+\text{i}t)|^{2k}\ll T(\log T)^{k^{2}+\unicode[STIX]{x1D716}}$. His method was used by Chandee [Q. J. Math.62 (2011), 545–572] to obtain upper bounds for shifted moments of the Riemann Zeta function. Building on these ideas of Chandee and Soundararajan, we obtain, conditionally, upper bounds for shifted moments of Dirichlet $L$-functions which allow us to derive upper bounds for moments of theta functions.
Consider a system of polynomials in many variables over the ring of integers of a number field $K$. We prove an asymptotic formula for the number of integral zeros of this system in homogeneously expanding boxes. As a consequence, any smooth and geometrically integral variety $X\subseteq \mathbb{P}_{K}^{m}$ satisfies the Hasse principle, weak approximation, and the Manin–Peyre conjecture if only its dimension is large enough compared to its degree. This generalizes work of Skinner, who considered the case where all polynomials have the same degree, and recent work of Browning and Heath-Brown, who considered the case where $K=\mathbb{Q}$. Our main tool is Skinner’s number field version of the Hardy–Littlewood circle method. As a by-product, we point out and correct an error in Skinner’s treatment of the singular integral.
We generalize to higher dimensions the Bavard–Ghys construction of the hyperbolic metric on the space of polygons with fixed directions of edges. The space of convex $d$-dimensional polyhedra with fixed directions of facet normals has a decomposition into type cones that correspond to different combinatorial types of polyhedra. This decomposition is a subfan of the secondary fan of a vector configuration and can be analyzed with the help of Gale diagrams. We construct a family of quadratic forms on each of the type cones using the theory of mixed volumes. The Alexandrov–Fenchel inequalities ensure that these forms have exactly one positive eigenvalue. This introduces a piecewise hyperbolic structure on the space of similarity classes of polyhedra with fixed directions of facet normals. We show that some of the dihedral angles on the boundary of the resulting cone-manifold are equal to $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70B}/2$.
We say that a planar set $A$ has the Kakeya property if there exist two different positions of $A$ such that $A$ can be continuously moved from the first position to the second within a set of arbitrarily small area. We prove that if $A$ is closed and has the Kakeya property, then the union of the non-trivial connected components of $A$ can be covered by a null set which is either the union of parallel lines or the union of concentric circles. In particular, if $A$ is closed, connected and has the Kakeya property, then $A$ can be covered by a line or a circle.
We say a graph is (Qn,Qm)-saturated if it is a maximal Qm-free subgraph of the n-dimensional hypercube Qn. A graph is said to be (Qn,Qm)-semi-saturated if it is a subgraph of Qn and adding any edge forms a new copy of Qm. The minimum number of edges a (Qn,Qm)-saturated graph (respectively (Qn,Qm)-semi-saturated graph) can have is denoted by sat(Qn,Qm) (respectively s-sat(Qn,Qm)). We prove that
for fixed m, disproving a conjecture of Santolupo that, when m=2, this limit is 1/4. Further, we show by a different method that sat(Qn, Q2)=O(2n), and that s-sat(Qn, Qm)=O(2n), for fixed m. We also prove the lower bound
A construction of Alon yields a sequence of highly pseudorandom triangle-free graphs with edge density significantly higher than one might expect from comparison with random graphs. We give an alternative construction for such graphs.
Let G be an abelian group of cardinality n, where hcf(n, 6) = 1, and let A be a random subset of G. Form a graph ΓA on vertex set G by joining x to y if and only if x + y ∈ A. Then, with high probability as n → ∞, the chromatic number χ(ΓA) is at most $(1 + o(1))\tfrac{n}{2\log_2 n}$. This is asymptotically sharp when G = ℤ/nℤ, n prime.
For a given graph G of minimum degree at least k, let Gp denote the random spanning subgraph of G obtained by retaining each edge independently with probability p = p(k). We prove that if p ⩾ (logk + loglogk + ωk(1))/k, where ωk(1) is any function tending to infinity with k, then Gp asymptotically almost surely contains a cycle of length at least k + 1. When we take G to be the complete graph on k + 1 vertices, our theorem coincides with the classic result on the threshold probability for the existence of a Hamilton cycle in the binomial random graph.
We prove that triangular configurations are plentiful in large subsets of Cartesian squares of finite quasirandom groups from classes having the quasirandom ultraproduct property, for example the class of finite simple groups. This is deduced from a strong double recurrence theorem for two commuting measure-preserving actions of a minimally almost periodic (not necessarily amenable or locally compact) group on a (not necessarily separable) probability space.
We study the lower tail large deviation problem for subgraph counts in a random graph. Let XH denote the number of copies of H in an Erdős–Rényi random graph $\mathcal{G}(n,p)$. We are interested in estimating the lower tail probability $\mathbb{P}(X_H \le (1-\delta) \mathbb{E} X_H)$ for fixed 0 < δ < 1.
Thanks to the results of Chatterjee, Dembo and Varadhan, this large deviation problem has been reduced to a natural variational problem over graphons, at least for p ≥ n−αH (and conjecturally for a larger range of p). We study this variational problem and provide a partial characterization of the so-called ‘replica symmetric’ phase. Informally, our main result says that for every H, and 0 < δ < δH for some δH > 0, as p → 0 slowly, the main contribution to the lower tail probability comes from Erdős–Rényi random graphs with a uniformly tilted edge density. On the other hand, this is false for non-bipartite H and δ close to 1.
Judicious partitioning problems on graphs and hypergraphs ask for partitions that optimize several quantities simultaneously. Let k ≥ 2 be an integer and let G be a hypergraph with mi edges of size i for i=1,2. Bollobás and Scott conjectured that G has a partition into k classes, each of which contains at most $m_1/k+m_2/k^2+O(\sqrt{m_1+m_2})$ edges. In this paper, we confirm the conjecture affirmatively by showing that G has a partition into k classes, each of which contains at most
We consider the Widom–Rowlinson model of two types of interacting particles on d-regular graphs. We prove a tight upper bound on the occupancy fraction, the expected fraction of vertices occupied by a particle under a random configuration from the model. The upper bound is achieved uniquely by unions of complete graphs on d + 1 vertices, Kd+1. As a corollary we find that Kd+1 also maximizes the normalized partition function of the Widom–Rowlinson model over the class of d-regular graphs. A special case of this shows that the normalized number of homomorphisms from any d-regular graph G to the graph HWR, a path on three vertices with a loop on each vertex, is maximized by Kd+1. This proves a conjecture of Galvin.
We study two-weight norm inequalities for a vector-valued operator from a weighted $L^{p}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E})$-space to mixed norm $L_{l^{s}}^{q}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D707})$ spaces, $1<p<\infty$, $0<q<p$. We apply these results to the boundedness of Wolff’s potentials.