English

Transcendence of Power Series for Some Number Theoretic Functions

Number Theory 2008-06-11 v1

Abstract

We give a new proof of Fatou's theorem: {\em if an algebraic function has a power series expansion with bounded integer coefficients, then it must be a rational function.} This result is applied to show that for any non--trivial completely multiplicative function from N\mathbb{N} to {1,1}\{-1,1\}, the series n=1f(n)zn\sum_{n=1}^\infty f(n)z^n is transcendental over Z[z]\mathbb{Z}[z]; in particular, n=1λ(n)zn\sum_{n=1}^\infty \lambda(n)z^n is transcendental, where λ\lambda is Liouville's function. The transcendence of n=1μ(n)zn\sum_{n=1}^\infty \mu(n)z^n is also proved.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.0806.1563,
  title  = {Transcendence of Power Series for Some Number Theoretic Functions},
  author = {Michael Coons and Peter Borwein},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0806.1563},
  year   = {2008}
}

Comments

3 pages

R2 v1 2026-06-21T10:48:58.272Z