English

Superlinear complexity of the $(3/2)^n$ steering word

Number Theory 2026-07-13 v1

Abstract

Write (3/2)n=mn+\epsn(3/2)^n = m_n + \eps_n with mnm_n the nearest integer and \epsn[12,12)\eps_n\in[-\tfrac12,\tfrac12), and let T=(tn)T=(t_n), tn=2mn+13mnt_n=2m_{n+1}-3m_n, be the resulting \emph{steering word}: the step-by-step record of the map x32xx\mapsto\tfrac32 x on the orbit of 11, coded by nearest-integer rounding. Using results by Corvaja--Zannier and Nair--Kumar--Rout we prove that the subword complexity \pT(k)\pT(k) of TT is superlinear, \pT(k)/k\pT(k)/k\to\infty. The argument is completely formalized in Lean-4, depending only on the Subspace Theorem.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2607.11648,
  title  = {Superlinear complexity of the $(3/2)^n$ steering word},
  author = {Ralf Stephan},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2607.11648},
  year   = {2026}
}