Introduction. Let F be a subset of a group G (written additively) and let κ be a positive integer. Following [1] we shall write

and

A metric space (X, ρ) is called precompact, if, for every ε > 0, there is a finite ε-cover (a covering by sets of diameter ≤ ε). The space (X, ρ) is separable if for every e there is a countable ε-cover. There should be some in-between condition. We say that (X, ρ) has fine covers, if, for every ε > 0, there exists a countable ε-cover (U1, U2, …), such that the diameter ∂(Ui) tends to zero as i → ∞. In fact, Goodey [1] has related this property to Hausdorff dimension. We show that a space with fine covers need not be σ-precompact and that on any complete metrizable non-σ-compact space X there is a metric ρ* such that (X, ρ*) has no fine cover.

Lyndon's axiomatic methods are used in [1] to show, among other things, that a group G with an integer valued length function satisfying certain conditions is free. At the end of his paper [2] Lyndon gives a method of embedding such a group in a free group whose natural length function extends the function on G. We construct here a simpler embedding with the same property.

A generalization of the following two facts is proved: the class of generalized zonoids is dense in the class of convex compact bodies with a centre of symmetry, and the class of generalized triangle bodies is dense in the class of all convex compact bodies (proved by Schneider). The main result is deduced from a more general representation theoretical statement.

This note presents a classification of commutative, cancellative monoids S by flatness properties of their associated S-acts.

Call a set of natural numbers subset-sum-distinct (or SSD) if all pairwise distinct subsets have unequal sums. One wants to construct SSD sets in which the largest element is as small as possible. Given any SSD set, it is easy to construct an SSD set with one more element in which the biggest element is exactly double the biggest element in the original set. For any SSD set, we construct another SSD set with k more elements whose largest element is less than 2k times the largest element in the original set. This claim has been made previously for a different construction, but we show that that claim is false.

§0. Introduction. Low-dimensional topology is dominated by the fundamental group. However, since every finitely presented group is the fundamental group of some closed 4-manifold, it is often stated that the effective influence of π1 ends in dimension three. This is not quite true, however, and there are some interesting border disputes. In this paper, we show that, by imposing the extra condition of parallelizability on the tangent bundle, the dominion of π1 is extended by an extra dimension.

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 consider the classical theta operator ${\it\theta}$ on modular forms modulo $p^{m}$ and level $N$ prime to $p$, where $p$ is a prime greater than three. Our main result is that ${\it\theta}$ mod $p^{m}$ will map forms of weight $k$ to forms of weight $k+2+2p^{m-1}(p-1)$ and that this weight is optimal in certain cases when $m$ is at least two. Thus, the natural expectation that ${\it\theta}$ mod $p^{m}$ should map to weight $k+2+p^{m-1}(p-1)$ is shown to be false. The primary motivation for this study is that application of the ${\it\theta}$ operator on eigenforms mod $p^{m}$ corresponds to twisting the attached Galois representations with the cyclotomic character. Our construction of the ${\it\theta}$-operator mod $p^{m}$ gives an explicit weight bound on the twist of a modular mod $p^{m}$ Galois representation by the cyclotomic character.

In this paper we present a new family of identities for multiple harmonic sums which generalize a recent result of Hessami Pilehrood et al  [Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. (to appear)]. We then apply it to obtain a family of identities relating multiple zeta star values to alternating Euler sums. In such a typical identity the entries of the multiple zeta star values consist of blocks of arbitrarily long 2-strings separated by positive integers greater than two while the largest depth of the alternating Euler sums depends only on the number of 2-string blocks but not on their lengths.

In a $d$ -dimensional convex body $K$ random points $X_{0},\ldots ,X_{d}$ are chosen. Their convex hull is a random simplex. The expected volume of a random simplex is monotone under set inclusion if $K\subset L$ implies that the expected volume of a random simplex in $K$ is smaller than the expected volume of a random simplex in $L$ . Continuing work of Rademacher [On the monotonicity of the expected volume of a random simplex. Mathematika58 (2012), 77–91], it is shown that moments of the volume of random simplices are, in general, not monotone under set inclusion.

Combinatorial discrepancy is a complexity measure of a collection of sets which quantifies how well the sets in the collection can be simultaneously balanced. More precisely, we are given an $n$-point set $P$, and a collection ${\mathcal{F}}=\{F_{1},\ldots ,F_{m}\}$ of subsets of $P$, and our goal is color $P$ with two colors, red and blue, so that the maximum over the $F_{i}$ of the absolute difference between the number of red elements and the number of blue elements (the discrepancy) is minimized. Combinatorial discrepancy has many applications in mathematics and computer science, including constructions of uniformly distributed point sets, and lower bounds for data structures and private data analysis algorithms. We investigate the combinatorial discrepancy of geometrically defined systems, in which $P$ is an $n$-point set in $d$-dimensional space, and ${\mathcal{F}}$ is the collection of subsets of $P$ induced by dilations and translations of a fixed convex polytope $B$. Such set systems include systems of sets induced by axis-aligned boxes, whose discrepancy is the subject of the well-known Tusnády problem. We prove new discrepancy upper and lower bounds for such set systems by extending the approach based on factorization norms previously used by the author, Matoušek, and Talwar. We also outline applications of our results to geometric discrepancy, data structure lower bounds, and differential privacy.

The dynamics of cluster growth can be modelled by the following infinite system of ordinary differential equations, first proposed by Smoluchowski, [8],

where cj=cj(t) represents the physical concentration of j-clusters (aggregates of j identical particles), aj,k=aj,k≥0 are the time-independent coagulation coefficients, measuring the effectiveness of the coagulation process between a j-cluster and a k-cluster, and the first sum in the right-hand side of (1) is defined to be zero if j = 1.

Dimension prints were developed in 1988 to distinguish between different fractal sets in Euclidean spaces having the same Hausdorff dimension but with very different geometric characteristics. In this paper we compute the dimension prints of some fractal sets, including generalized Cantor sets on the unit circle S1 in ℝ2 and the graphs of generalized Lebesgue functions, also in ℝ2. In this second case we show that the dimension print for the graphs of the Lebesgue functions can approach the maximal dimension print of a set of dimension 1. We study the dimension prints of Cartesian products of linear Borel sets and obtain the exact dimension print when each linear set has positive measure in its dimension and the dimension of the Cartesian product is the sum of the dimensions of the factors.

It is proved that C(K) has no equivalent uniformly Gâteaux differentiable norm (UGD) when K-is an uncountable separable scattered com¬pact space. This result is applied to obtain an example of scattered compact K such that K′″ = ∅ and C(K) has no UGD renorming.

Let q be a prime number and let a = (a1, …, as) be an s-tuple of distinct integers modulo q. For any x coprime with q, let be such that . For fixed s and q→∞ an asymptotic formula is given for the number of residue classes x modulo q for which

The more general case, when q is not necessarily prime and x is restricted to lie in a given subinterval of [1, q], is also treated.

Let

where φ denotes Euler's function. In this memoir we study the set w of sigmaphi numbers, that is, those composite natural numbers n which satisfy

The smallest such number is 65, and they appear to be moderately frequent. There are 290 sigma-phi numbers not exceeding 105 and 1,231 not exceeding 106. By comparison, we observe that the number of primes in these ranges is 9,592 and 78,498, respectively. Since the primes also satisfy the relationship (1.2) a sigma-phi number can be thought of as a kind of pseudo-prime. The motivation for studying sigma-phi numbers is that they should have similar properties to Carmichael numbers but be easier to study. A Carmichael number is a number n such that the least common multiple of the φ(pk) with pk||n divides n-1, i.e., by Korseldt's criterion, a number for which p-1||n-1 whenever p|n. The number of Carmichael numbers not exceeding 105 and 106 is 16 and 43, respectively. It seems that the counting functions for Carmichael and sigma-phi numbers have somewhat similar growth rates. The counts above are skewed by the fact that there are many sigma-phi numbers with exactly two prime factors but there are no Carmichael numbers of this kind.

Denote by Bn the n-dimensional unit ball centred at o. It is known that in every lattice packing of Bn there is a cylindrical hole of infinite length whenever n≥3. As a counterpart, this note mainly proves the following result: for any fixed ε with ε>0, there exist a periodic point set P(n, ε) and a constant c(n, ε) such that Bn + P(n, ε) is a packing in Rn, and the length of the longest segment contained in Rn\{int(εBn) + P(n, ε)} is bounded by c(n, ε) from above. Generalizations and applications are presented.

Generalizing an earlier notion of secondary polytopes, Billera and Sturmfels introduced the important concept of fibre polytopes, and showed how they were related to certain kinds of subdivision induced by the projection of one polytope onto another. There are two obvious ways in which this concept can be extended: first, to possibly unbounded polyhedra, and second, by making the definition a categorical one. In the course of these investigations, it became clear that the whole subject fitted even more naturally into the context of finite tilings which admit strong duals. In turn, this new approach provides more unified and perspicuous explanations of many previously known but apparently quite disparate results.

The kth projection function of a convex body K ⊂ ℝn assigns to any k-dimensional linear subspace of ℝn the k-volume of the orthogonal projection of K to that subspace. Let K and K0 be convex bodies in ℝn, and let K0 be centrally symmetric and satisfy a weak regularity and curvature condition (which includes all K0 with ∂K0 of class C2 with positive radii of curvature). Assume that K and K0 have proportional 1st projection functions (i.e., width functions) and proportional kth projection functions. For 2 ≤ k < (n + 1)/2 and for k = 3, n = 5, it is shown that K and K0 are homothetic. In the special case where K0 is a Euclidean ball, characterizations of Euclidean balls as convex bodies of constant width and constant k-brightness are thus obtained.