English

On the Glide of 3x+1 Problem

Number Theory 2017-10-10 v2

Abstract

For any positive integer nn, define an iterated function f(n)=\left\{\begin{array}{ll} n/2, & \mbox{$n$ even,} \\ 3n+1, & \mbox{$n$ odd.} \end{array} \right. Suppose kk (if it exists) is the lowest number such that fk(n)<nf^{k}(n)<n, and there are O(n)O(n) "multiply by three and add one" and E(n)E(n) "divide by two" from nn to fk(n)f^{k}(n), then there must be 2E(n)1<3O(n)<2E(n). 2^{E(n)-1}<3^{O(n)}<2^{E(n)}. Our results confirm the conjecture proposed by Terras in 1976.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1710.01525,
  title  = {On the Glide of 3x+1 Problem},
  author = {Yuyin Yu and Dingyi Pei},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1710.01525},
  year   = {2017}
}

Comments

We can not prove Lemma 1 in Sect 2.4, and Terras did not prove it either, we misunderstood Terras's result here. Thus our proof about Theorem 2 is wrong

R2 v1 2026-06-22T22:03:21.263Z