Let $b_{3,5}(n)$ denote the number of partitions of $n$ into parts that are not multiples of 3 or 5. We establish several infinite families of congruences modulo 2 for $b_{3,5}(n)$. In the process, we also prove numerous parity results for broken 7-diamond partitions.

Let G be an additive abelian group, let n ⩾ 1 be an integer, let S be a sequence over G of length |S| ⩾ n + 1, and let ${\mathsf h}$(S) denote the maximum multiplicity of a term in S. Let Σn(S) denote the set consisting of all elements in G which can be expressed as the sum of terms from a subsequence of S having length n. In this paper, we prove that either ng ∈ Σn(S) for every term g in S whose multiplicity is at least ${\mathsf h}$(S) − 1 or |Σn(S)| ⩾ min{n + 1, |S| − n + | supp (S)| − 1}, where |supp(S)| denotes the number of distinct terms that occur in S. When G is finite cyclic and n = |G|, this confirms a conjecture of Y. O. Hamidoune from 2003.

We examine the tail distributions of integer partition ranks and cranks by investigating tail moments, which are analogous to the positive moments introduced by Andrews et al. [‘The odd moments of ranks and cranks’, J. Combin. Theory Ser. A120(1) (2013), 77–91].

Let $\text{pod}_{-4}(n)$ denote the number of partition quadruples of $n$ where the odd parts in each partition are distinct. We find many arithmetic properties of $\text{pod}_{-4}(n)$ including the following infinite family of congruences: for any integers ${\it\alpha}\geq 1$ and $n\geq 0$,

$$\begin{eqnarray}\text{pod}_{-4}\biggl(3^{{\it\alpha}+1}n+\frac{5\cdot 3^{{\it\alpha}}+1}{2}\biggr)\equiv 0~(\text{mod}~9).\end{eqnarray}$$

$\text{pod}_{-4}(n)$

An asymptotic formula is obtained for the number of rational points of bounded height on the class of varieties described in the title line. The formula is proved via the Hardy-Littlewood method, and along the way we establish two new results on Weyl sums that are of some independent interest.

An integer $d$ is called a jumping champion for a given $x$ if $d$ is the most common gap between consecutive primes up to $x$. Occasionally, several gaps are equally common. Hence, there can be more than one jumping champion for the same $x$. In 1999, Odlyzko et al provided convincing heuristics and empirical evidence for the truth of the hypothesis that the jumping champions greater than 1 are 4 and the primorials $2,6,30,210,2310,\ldots \,$. In this paper, we prove that an appropriate form of the Hardy–Littlewood prime $k$-tuple conjecture for prime pairs and prime triples implies that all sufficiently large jumping champions are primorials and that all sufficiently large primorials are jumping champions over a long range of $x$.

Let ${\it\mu}_{1},\ldots ,{\it\mu}_{s}$ be real numbers, with ${\it\mu}_{1}$ irrational. We investigate sums of shifted $k$th powers $\mathfrak{F}(x_{1},\ldots ,x_{s})=(x_{1}-{\it\mu}_{1})^{k}+\cdots +(x_{s}-{\it\mu}_{s})^{k}$. For $k\geqslant 4$, we bound the number of variables needed to ensure that if ${\it\eta}$ is real and ${\it\tau}>0$ is sufficiently large then there exist integers $x_{1}>{\it\mu}_{1},\ldots ,x_{s}>{\it\mu}_{s}$ such that $|\mathfrak{F}(\mathbf{x})-{\it\tau}|<{\it\eta}$. This is a real analogue to Waring’s problem. When $s\geqslant 2k^{2}-2k+3$, we provide an asymptotic formula. We prove similar results for sums of general univariate degree-$k$ polynomials.

We study sum-free sets in sparse random subsets of even-order abelian groups. In particular, we determine the sharp threshold for the following property: the largest such set is contained in some maximum-size sum-free subset of the group. This theorem extends recent work of Balogh, Morris and Samotij, who resolved the case G = ℤ2n, and who obtained a weaker threshold (up to a constant factor) in general.

1. Let r(n) denote the number of representations of the natural number n as the sum of one square and three fifth powers of positive integers. A formal use of the circle method predicts the asymptotic relation(1)

$\begin{equation*}r(n) = \frac{\Gamma(\frac32)\Gamma(\frac65)^3}{\Gamma(\frac{11}{10})} {\mathfrak s}(n) {n}^\frac1{10} (1 + o(1)) \qquad (n\to\infty).\end{equation*}$

${\mathfrak s}$

We estimate the number of solutions to $|y^{2}-x^{3}|\leqslant X$ with $N\leqslant y\leqslant 2N$, in terms of both $N$ and $X$.

Let $H$ be a Krull monoid with finite class group $G$ such that every class contains a prime divisor (for example, a ring of integers in an algebraic number field or a holomorphy ring in an algebraic function field). The catenary degree $\mathsf{c}(H)$ of $H$ is the smallest integer $N$ with the following property: for each $a\in H$ and each pair of factorizations $z,z^{\prime }$ of $a$, there exist factorizations $z=z_{0},\dots ,z_{k}=z^{\prime }$ of $a$ such that, for each $i\in [1,k]$, $z_{i}$ arises from $z_{i-1}$ by replacing at most $N$ atoms from $z_{i-1}$ by at most $N$ new atoms. To exclude trivial cases, suppose that $|G|\geq 3$. Then the catenary degree depends only on the class group $G$ and we have $\mathsf{c}(H)\in [3,\mathsf{D}(G)]$, where $\mathsf{D}(G)$ denotes the Davenport constant of $G$. The cases when $\mathsf{c}(H)\in \{3,4,\mathsf{D}(G)\}$ have been previously characterized (see Theorem A). Based on a characterization of the catenary degree determined in the paper by Geroldinger et al. [‘The catenary degree of Krull monoids I’, J. Théor. Nombres Bordeaux23 (2011), 137–169], we determine the class groups satisfying $\mathsf{c}(H)=\mathsf{D}(G)-1$. Apart from the extremal cases mentioned, the precise value of $\mathsf{c}(H)$ is known for no further class groups.

We extend results of Andrews and Bressoud [‘Vanishing coefficients in infinite product expansions’, J. Aust. Math. Soc. Ser. A27(2) (1979), 199–202] on the vanishing of coefficients in the series expansions of certain infinite products. These results have the form that if

$$\begin{eqnarray}\frac{(q^{r-tk},q^{mk-(r-tk)};q^{mk})_{\infty }}{(\pm q^{r},\pm q^{mk-r};q^{mk})_{\infty }}=:\mathop{\sum }_{n=0}^{\infty }c_{n}q^{n}\end{eqnarray}$$

$k$

$m$

$s$

$t$

$r=sm+t$

$c_{kn-rs}$

We give a new proof of Vinogradov’s three primes theorem, which asserts that all sufficiently large odd positive integers can be written as the sum of three primes. Existing proofs rely on the theory of $L$-functions, either explicitly or implicitly. Our proof is sieve theoretical and uses a transference principle, the idea of which was first developed by Green [Ann. of Math. (2) 161 (3) (2005), 1609–1636] and used in the proof of Green and Tao’s theorem [Ann. of Math. (2) 167 (2) (2008), 481–547]. To make our argument work, we also develop an additive combinatorial result concerning popular sums, which may be of independent interest.

Let $A\subset \{1,\dots ,N\}$ be a set of prime numbers containing no non-trivial arithmetic progressions. Suppose that $A$ has relative density ${\it\alpha}=|A|/{\it\pi}(N)$, where ${\it\pi}(N)$ denotes the number of primes in the set $\{1,\dots ,N\}$. By modifying Helfgott and De Roton’s work [Improving Roth’s theorem in the primes. Int. Math. Res. Not. IMRN2011 (4) (2011), 767–783], we improve their bound and show that

$$\begin{eqnarray}{\it\alpha}\ll \frac{(\log \log \log N)^{6}}{\log \log N}.\end{eqnarray}$$

For any positive integer $n$, let $f(n)$ denote the number of 1-shell totally symmetric plane partitions of $n$. Recently, Hirschhorn and Sellers [‘Arithmetic properties of 1-shell totally symmetric plane partitions’, Bull. Aust. Math. Soc.89 (2014), 473–478] and Yao [‘New infinite families of congruences modulo 4 and 8 for 1-shell totally symmetric plane partitions’, Bull. Aust. Math. Soc.90 (2014), 37–46] proved a number of congruences satisfied by $f(n)$. In particular, Hirschhorn and Sellers proved that $f(10n+5)\equiv 0\ (\text{mod}\ 5)$. In this paper, we establish the generating function of $f(30n+25)$ and prove that $f(250n+125)\equiv 0\ (\text{mod\ 25}).$

Let $A_{3}(n)$ denote the number of bipartitions of $n$ with 3-cores. Recently, Lin [‘Some results on bipartitions with 3-core’, J. Number Theory139 (2014), 44–52] established some congruences modulo 4, 5, 7 and 8 for $A_{3}(n)$. In this paper, we prove several infinite families of congruences modulo 3 and 9 for $A_{3}(n)$ by employing two identities due to Ramanujan.

Weinvestigate the Hasse principle for complete intersections cut out by a quadric hypersurface and a cubic hypersurface defined over the rational numbers.

Recently, Keith used the theory of modular forms to study 9-regular partitions modulo 2 and 3. He obtained one infinite family of congruences modulo 3, and meanwhile proposed an analogous conjecture. In this note, we show that 9-regular partitions and 3-cores satisfy the same congruences modulo 3. Thus, we first derive several results on 3-cores, and then generalise Keith’s conjecture and get a stronger result, which implies that all of Keith’s results on congruences modulo 3 are consequences of our result.

In 2012, Blecher [‘Geometry for totally symmetric plane partitions (TSPPs) with self-conjugate main diagonal’, Util. Math. 88 (2012), 223–235] introduced a special class of totally symmetric plane partitions, called $\def \xmlpi #1{}\def \mathsfbi #1{\boldsymbol {\mathsf {#1}}}\let \le =\leqslant \let \leq =\leqslant \let \ge =\geqslant \let \geq =\geqslant \def \Pr {\mathit {Pr}}\def \Fr {\mathit {Fr}}\def \Rey {\mathit {Re}}1$-shell totally symmetric plane partitions. Let $f(n)$ denote the number of $1$-shell totally symmetric plane partitions of weight $n$. More recently, Hirschhorn and Sellers [‘Arithmetic properties of 1-shell totally symmetric plane partitions’, Bull. Aust. Math. Soc. to appear. Published online 27 September 2013] discovered a number of arithmetic properties satisfied by $f(n)$. In this paper, employing some results due to Cui and Gu [‘Arithmetic properties of $l$-regular partitions’, Adv. Appl. Math. 51 (2013), 507–523], and Hirschhorn and Sellers, we prove several new infinite families of congruences modulo 4 and 8 for $1$-shell totally symmetric plane partitions. For example, we find that, for $n\geq 0$ and $\alpha \geq 1$,

$$\begin{equation*} f(8 \times 5^{2\alpha } n+39\times 5^{2\alpha -1})\equiv 0 \pmod 8. \end{equation*}$$

How many square tiles are needed to tile a circular floor? Tiles are cut to fit the boundary. We give an algorithm for cutting, rotating and re-using the off-cut parts, so that a circular floor requires $\def \xmlpi #1{}\def \mathsfbi #1{\boldsymbol {\mathsf {#1}}}\let \le =\leqslant \let \leq =\leqslant \let \ge =\geqslant \let \geq =\geqslant \def \Pr {\mathit {Pr}}\def \Fr {\mathit {Fr}}\def \Rey {\mathit {Re}} \pi R^2 + O(\delta R) + O(R^{2/3}) $ tiles, where $R$ is the radius and $\delta $ is the width of the cutting tool. The algorithm applies to any oval-shaped floor whose boundary has a continuous non-zero radius of curvature. The proof of the error estimate requires methods of analytic number theory.