English

Nilpotent polynomials over $\mathbb{Z}$

Number Theory 2024-06-25 v3

Abstract

For a polynomial u(x)u(x) in Z[x]\mathbb{Z}[x] and rZr\in\mathbb{Z}, we consider the orbit of uu at rr denoted and defined by Ou(r):={u(n)(r)  nN}\mathcal{O}_u(r):=\{u^{(n)}(r)~|~n\in\mathbb{N}\}. Here we study polynomials for which 00 is in the orbit, and we call such polynomials \textit{nilpotent at }rr of index mm where mm is the minimum element of the set {nN  u(n)(r)=0}\{n\in\mathbb N~|~u^{(n)}(r)=0\}. We provide here a complete classification of these polynomials when r4|r|\le 4, with r1|r|\le 1 already covered in the author's previous paper, titled \textit{Locally nilpotent polynomials over Z\mathbb Z}. The central goal of this paper is to study the following questions: (i) relation between the integers rr and mm when the set of nilpotent polynomials at rr of index mm is non-empty, (ii) classification of the integer polynomials with nilpotency index r|r| for large enough r|r|, and (iii) bounded integer polynomial sequences {rn}n0\{r_n\}_{n\ge 0}.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2401.01435,
  title  = {Nilpotent polynomials over $\mathbb{Z}$},
  author = {Sayak Sengupta},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2401.01435},
  year   = {2024}
}

Comments

23 pages in total. This is a continuation of the research done by the author in the paper "Locally nilpotent polynomials over $\mathbb{Z}$". Comments are welcome!

R2 v1 2026-06-28T14:07:20.892Z