English

On covering systems of integers

Number Theory 2017-05-15 v1

Abstract

A covering system of the integers is a finite collection of modular residue classes {ammodm}mS\{a_m \bmod{m}\}_{m \in S} whose union is all integers. Given a finite set SS of moduli, it is often difficult to tell whether there is a choice of residues modulo elements of SS covering the integers. Hough has shown that if the smallest modulus in SS is at least 101610^{16}, then there is none. However, the question of whether there is a covering of the integers with all odd moduli remains open. We consider multiplicative restrictions on the set of moduli to generalize Hough's negative solution to the minimum modulus problem. In particular, we find that every covering system of the integers has a modulus divisible by a prime number less than or equal to 1919. Hough and Nielsen have shown that every covering system has a modulus divisible by either 22 or 33.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1705.04372,
  title  = {On covering systems of integers},
  author = {Jackson Hopper},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1705.04372},
  year   = {2017}
}

Comments

11 pages, 1 table