Related papers: Extensions to the Method of Multiplicities, with a…
We study the problem of extracting randomness from somewhere-random sources, and related combinatorial phenomena: partition analogues of Shearer's lemma on projections. A somewhere-random source is a tuple $(X_1, \ldots, X_t)$ of (possibly…
Let $L$ be a set of lines of an affine space over a field and let $S$ be a set of points with the property that every line of $L$ is incident with at least $N$ points of $S$. Let $D$ be the set of directions of the lines of $L$ considered…
We survey recent (and not so recent) results concerning arrangements of lines, points and other geometric objects and the applications these results have in theoretical computer science and combinatorics. The three main types of problems we…
A Kakeya set is a subset of F^n, where F is a finite field of q elements, that contains a line in every direction. In this paper we show that the size of every Kakeya set is at least C_n * q^n, where C_n depends only on n. This improves the…
For a finite field GF(q) a Kakeya set K is a subset of GF(q)^n that contains a line in every direction. This paper derives new upper bounds on the minimum size of Kakeya sets when q is even.
We prove that a Kakeya set in a vector space over a finite field of size $q$ always supports a probability measure whose Fourier transform is bounded by $q^{-1}$ for all non-zero frequencies. We show that this bound is sharp in all…
A Kakeya set $S \subset (\mathbb{Z}/N\mathbb{Z})^n$ is a set containing a line in each direction. We show that, when $N$ is any square-free integer, the size of the smallest Kakeya set in $(\mathbb{Z}/N\mathbb{Z})^n$ is at least…
A Kakeya set in $\mathbb{F}_q^n$ is a set containing a line in every direction. We show that every Kakeya set in $\mathbb{F}_q^n$ has density at least $1/2^{n-1}$, matching the construction by Dvir, Kopparty, Saraf and Sudan.
In this dissertation we define a generalization of Kakeya sets in certain metric spaces. Kakeya sets in Euclidean spaces are sets of zero Lebesgue measure containing a segment of length one in every direction. A famous conjecture, known as…
Let $q,n \geq 1$ be integers, $[q]=\{1,\ldots, q\}$, and $\mathbb F$ be a field with $|\mathbb F|\geq q$. The set of increasing sequences $$ I(n,q)=\{(f_1,f_2, \dots, f_n) \in [q]^n:~ f_1\leq f_2\leq\cdots \leq f_n \} $$ can be mapped via…
The dimension of Kakeya sets can be bounded using sum-difference exponents $\SD(R;s)$ for various sets of rational slopes $R$ and output slope $s$; the arithmetic Kakeya conjecture, which implies the Kakeya conjecture in all dimensions,…
We adapt Guth's polynomial partitioning argument for the Fourier restriction problem to the context of the Kakeya problem. By writing out the induction argument as a recursive algorithm, additional multiscale geometric information is made…
Given a subset of size $k$ of a very large universe a randomized way to find this subset could consist of deleting half of the universe and then searching the remaining part. With a probability of $2^{-k}$ one will succeed. By probability…
A Kakeya set $\mathcal{K}$ in an affine plane of order $q$ is the point set covered by a set $\mathcal{L}$ of $q+1$ pairwise non-parallel lines. Large Kakeya sets were studied by Dover and Mellinger; in [6] they showed that Kakeya sets with…
This thesis investigates two problems that are discrete analogues of two harmonic analytic problems which lie in the heart of research in the field. More specifically, we consider discrete analogues of the maximal Kakeya operator conjecture…
The restriction and Kakeya problems in Euclidean space have received much attention in the last few decades, and are related to many problems in harmonic analysis, PDE, and number theory. In this paper we initiate the study of these…
We study subsets of the $n$-dimensional vector space over the finite field $\mathbb{F}_q$, for odd $q$, which contain either a sphere for each radius or a sphere for each first coordinate of the center. We call such sets radii spherical…
The Fourier restriction phenomenon and the size of Kakeya sets are explored in the setting of the ring of integers modulo $N$ for general $N$ and a striking similarity with the corresponding euclidean problems is observed. One should…
We prove that every Kakeya set in $\mathbb{R}^3$ formed from lines of the form $(a,b,0) + \operatorname{span}(c,d,1)$ with $ad-bc=1$ must have Hausdorff dimension $3$; Kakeya sets of this type are called $SL_2$ Kakeya sets. This result was…
A Kakeya set contains a line in each direction. Dvir proved a lower bound on the size of any Kakeya set in a finite field using the polynomial method. We prove analogues of Dvir's result for non-degenerate conics, that is, parabolae and…