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Honest bernoulli excursions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 July 2016

Laurel Smith
Affiliation:
Texas A&M University
Persi Diaconis*
Affiliation:
Stanford University
*
Postal address: Department of Statistics, Sequoia Hall, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305, USA.

Abstract

For simple random walk on the integers, consider the chance that the walk has traveled distance k from its start given that its first return is at time 2n. We derive a limiting approximation accurate to order 1/n. We give a combinatorial explanation for a functional equation satisfied by the limit and show this yields the functional equation of Riemann's zeta function.

Type
Research Papers
Copyright
Copyright © Applied Probability Trust 1988 

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Footnotes

Research supported by NSF Grant DMS 86-00235.

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