English

Ramanujan sums and rectangular power sums

Combinatorics 2025-09-09 v2 Group Theory Number Theory

Abstract

For a fixed nonnegative integer uu and positive integer nn, we investigate the symmetric function dn(cd(nd))updnd,\sum_{d|n} \left(c_d(\tfrac{n}{d})\right)^u p_d^{\tfrac{n}{d}}, where pnp_n denotes the nnth power sum symmetric function, and cd(r)c_d(r) is a Ramanujan sum, equal to the sum of the rrth powers of all the primitive ddth roots of unity. We establish the Schur positivity of these functions for u=0u=0 and u=1u=1, showing that, in each case, the associated representation of the symmetric group Sn\mathfrak{S}_n decomposes into a sum of Foulkes representations, that is, representations induced from the irreducibles of the cyclic subgroup generated by the long cycle. We also conjecture Schur positivity for the case u=2u= 2.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2305.12007,
  title  = {Ramanujan sums and rectangular power sums},
  author = {John Shareshian and Sheila Sundaram},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2305.12007},
  year   = {2025}
}

Comments

17 pages, minor changes per referee report

R2 v1 2026-06-28T10:39:45.500Z