Related papers: A coding problem for pairs of subsets
For a family $\mathcal{F}$ of sets and a disjoint pair $A,B$ we let $\mathcal{F}(A,\overline{B})=\{F\in \mathcal{F}: A\subseteq F, ~B\cap F=\emptyset\}$. The \textbf{$(p,q)$-d\"omd\"od\"om} of a family $\mathcal{F}\subseteq 2^{[n]}$ is…
We consider the problem of determining the number of distinct distances between two point sets in $\mathbb{R}^2$ where one point set $\mathcal{P}_1$ of size $m$ lies on a real algebraic curve of fixed degree $r$, and the other point set…
Given two disjoint sets $W_1$ and $W_2$ of points in the plane, the Optimal Discretization problem asks for the minimum size of a family of horizontal and vertical lines that separate $W_1$ from $W_2$, that is, in every region into which…
For a set of positive integers $D$, a $k$-term $D$-diffsequence is a sequence of positive integers $a_1<a_2<\cdots<a_k$ such that $a_i-a_{i-1}\in D$ for $i=2,3,\cdots,k$. For $k\in\mathbb{Z}^+$ and $D\subset \mathbb{Z}^+$, we define…
Let $k \geq 2$ and $b \geq 3$ be integers, and suppose that $d_1, d_2 \in \{0,1,\dots, b - 1\}$ are distinct and coprime. Let $\mathcal{S}$ be the set of non-negative integers, all of whose digits in base $b$ are either $d_1$ or $d_2$. Then…
A king invites n couples to sit around a round table with 2n+1 seats. For each couple, the king decides a prescribed distance d between 1 and n which the two spouses have to be seated from each other (distance d means that they are…
We prove that almost any pair of real numbers a,b, satisfies the following inhomogeneous uniform version of Littlewood's conjecture: (*) forall x,y in R, liminf_{|n|\to\infty} |n|<na - x> <nb - y> = 0, where <-> denotes the distance from…
In the $d$-Scattered Set problem we are asked to select at least $k$ vertices of a given graph, so that the distance between any pair is at least $d$. We study the problem's (in-)approximability and offer improvements and extensions of…
For a positive integer $d\geq 2$, a family $\mathcal F\subseteq \binom{[n]}{k}$ is said to be d-wise intersecting if $|F_1\cap F_2\cap \dots\cap F_d|\geq 1$ for all $F_1, F_2, \dots ,F_d\in \mathcal F$. A d-wise intersecting family…
For k>=3 let A \subset [1,N] be a set not containing a solution to a_1 x_1+...+a_k x_k=a_1 x_{k+1}+...+a_k x_{2k} in distinct integers. We prove that there is an epsilon>0 depending on the coefficients of the equation such that every such A…
We introduce \emph{Term Coding}, a novel framework for analysing extremal problems in discrete mathematics by encoding them as finite systems of \emph{term equations} (and, optionally, \emph{non-equality constraints}). In its basic form,…
Let $\{(A_i,B_i)\}_{i=1}^{m}$ be a collection of pairs of sets with $|A_i|=a$ and $|B_i|=b$ for $1\leq i\leq m$. Suppose that $A_i\cap B_j=\emptyset$ if and only if $i=j$, then by the famous Bollob\'{a}s theorem, we have the size of this…
A symmetric subset of the reals is one that remains invariant under some reflection z --> c-z. We consider, for any 0 < x <= 1, the largest real number D(x) such that every subset of $[0,1]$ with measure greater than x contains a symmetric…
Let $n>s>0$ be integers, $X$ an $n$-element set and $\mathscr{A}, \mathscr{B}\subset 2^X$ two families. If $|A\cup B|\le s$ for all $A\in\mathscr{A}, B\in \mathscr{B}$, then $\mathscr{A}$ and $\mathscr{B}$ are called cross $s$-union.…
The bilateral minimum distance of a binary linear code is the maximum $d$ such that all nonzero codewords have weights between $d$ and $n-d$. Let $Q\subset \{0,1\}^n$ be a binary linear code whose dual has bilateral minimum distance at…
We give a simple inequality that compares the laws of two random variables taking values in a convex subset of a normed vector space. By combining this with Arratia's coupling, recently refined by Koukoulopoulos and the author, we obtain a…
For a fixed integer $k\geqslant 2$, let $G\in \mathcal{G}(n,p)$ be a simple connected graph on $n\rightarrow\infty$ vertices with the expected degree $d=np$ satisfying $d\geqslant c$ and $d^{k-1}= o(n)$ for some large enough constant $c$.…
We present two short proofs giving the best known asymptotic lower bound for the maximum element in a set of $n$ positive integers with distinct subset sums.
The Erd\H{o}s distance problem concerns the least number of distinct distances that can be determined by $N$ points in the plane. The integer lattice with $N$ points is known as \textit{near-optimal}, as it spans $\Theta(N/\sqrt{\log(N)})$…
The maximum parsimony distance $d_{\textrm{MP}}(T_1,T_2)$ and the bounded-state maximum parsimony distance $d_{\textrm{MP}}^t(T_1,T_2)$ measure the difference between two phylogenetic trees $T_1,T_2$ in terms of the maximum difference…