We study the Lonely Runner Conjecture (LRC), conceived by J\"org M. Wills in the 1960's: Given positive integers $n_1, n_2, \dots, n_k$, there exists a positive real number $t$ such that for all $1 \le j \le k$ the distance of $t \,n_j$ to the nearest integer is at least $\frac{ 1 }{ k+1 }$. We prove that for any counterexample or tight instance $\mathbf{n}$ of LRC, $\mathbf{m} \cdot \mathbf{n} = 0$ for some $\mathbf{m} \in \mathbb{Z}^k$ with $0<\| \mathbf{m} \|_1 \le \min(2k+3, \ \frac{ k+1 }{ k-1 } \mathrm{flt}(k))$ where $\mathrm{flt}(k)$ denotes Khinchin's (1948) flatness constant limiting the lattice width of a $k$-dimensional convex body without interior integer points. In other words, potential counterexamples to LRC lie on a finite set of hyperplanes in the parameter space. Our proofs use Fourier analysis and a geometric reformulation of LRC, and our results generalize to the situation of shifted lonely runners of varying measures of loneliness. Our results imply and generalize a theorem of Czerwi\'nski (2012) that when we choose $\mathbf{n}$ at random then, with probability tending to 1, the measure of loneliness $\frac{1}{ k+1 }$ can be replaced by $\frac 1 2 - \epsilon$.
For $k\geq2$, let $S_r(k;\ell)$ be the smallest $n$, if exists, such that every $r$-coloring of $\{1,2,\ldots,n\}$ has a monochromatic solution $\mathcal{S}$ to the equation \[ x_1+x_2+\cdots+x_k=x_{k+1} \] such that the number of distinct integers in $\mathcal{S}$ is exactly $\ell+1$. We prove that, if $\ell\geq2$ is...
In this paper, we give a negative answer to Wang's conjecture. For every $n\geq 3$, there exist $\varepsilon>0$ and $\delta \in (0,1)$ such that, for all $q$ and $\lambda$ satisfying \[ \frac{n}{n-2}-\varepsilon<q\le \frac{n}{n-2}, \qquad \frac{1}{q-1}\cdot \delta<\lambda\le \frac{1}{q-1}, \] there exists a bounded Euc...
For a positive integer $n$, write $[n]=\{1,\ldots,n\}$. A strictly increasing sequence of integers $x_1<\cdots<x_k$ is an \emph{ascending wave} if its consecutive differences are nondecreasing. Let $g(n)$ be the largest integer $k$ such that every set $A\subseteq[n]$ with $|A|\ge n/2$ contains an ascending wave of leng...
Let $G= C_{n_1}\oplus\cdots\oplus C_{n_r}$ be a finite abelian group with $1<n_1\mid\cdots\mid n_r$, and let $\rr(G)=r$ denote its rank. The Davenport constant $\DD(G)$ is the least integer $\ell$ such that every sequence of $\ell$ elements of $G$ contains a nonempty zero-sum subsequence, and $\DD^*(G)=1+\sum_{i=1}^r(n...
Let $q_m=2m/(m+1)$ and put \[ \beta_0=\frac{3}{2}+\frac{1}{\log 2}=2.9426950408\ldots, \] where $\log$ is the natural logarithm. We give a proof scheme showing that, for every $\varepsilon>0$, there is $C_\varepsilon<\infty$ such that every complex-valued function $f:\{-1,1\}^n\to\C$ of Fourier degree at most $m$ satis...
Joseph Slote, Chun-Kai Tseng, Alexander Volberg· 0 citations
In 1948, Erd\"{o}s and Straus formulated a conjecture : for any positive integer $n>2$, there exist positive integers $n_1,n_2$ and $n_3$ such that \begin{equation}\frac{4}{n}=\frac{1}{n_1}+\frac{1}{n_2}+\frac{1}{n_3},\nonumber\end{equation} which is still open. It is known that the conjecture holds if one can prove it...
Xiao-Ping Xu· 0 citations
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