English

Nuclear partitions and a formula for $p(n)$

Number Theory 2020-06-22 v4 Combinatorics

Abstract

Define a "nuclear partition" to be an integer partition with no part equal to one. In this study we prove a simple formula to compute the partition function p(n)p(n) by counting only the nuclear partitions of nn, a vanishingly small subset by comparison with all partitions of nn as nn\to \infty. Variations on the proof yield other formulas for p(n)p(n), as well as Ramanujan-like congruences and an application to parity of the partition function.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1912.00575,
  title  = {Nuclear partitions and a formula for $p(n)$},
  author = {Robert Schneider},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1912.00575},
  year   = {2020}
}

Comments

6 pages (typos corrected in this update), accepted for publication in the Journal of the Ramanujan Mathematical Society

R2 v1 2026-06-23T12:32:39.897Z