English

Periods of Iterated Rational Functions over a Finite Field

Number Theory 2017-01-10 v3 Combinatorics

Abstract

Choose a random degree d poly f with coefficients in a finite field F. We estimate the ultimate period of f under compositional iteration. We also determine the joint distribution of the small cycle lengths in the graph with edges (x,f(x)), x in F. The proofs use Lagrange interpolation and the method of factorial moments.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1508.04193,
  title  = {Periods of Iterated Rational Functions over a Finite Field},
  author = {Charles Burnette and Eric Schmutz},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1508.04193},
  year   = {2017}
}

Comments

Improved results and exposition. To appearing IJNT