Related papers: A ternary square-free sequence avoiding factors eq…

Let $s_n$ be the number of words consisting of the ternary alphabet consisting of the digits 0, 1, and 2 such that no subword (or factor) is a square (a word concatenated with itself, e.g., $11$, $1212$, or $102102$). From computational…

We prove that every concatenation of $10$ or more binary squares contains an overlap. The bound $10$ is best possible. In contrast, over a ternary alphabet, there are infinitely long overlap-free words that consist of a concatenation of…

In combinatorics on words, a word $w$ over an alphabet $\Sigma$ is said to avoid a pattern $p$ over an alphabet $\Delta$ if there is no factor $f$ of $w$ such that $f=h(p)$ where $h:\Delta^*\to\Sigma^*$ is a non-erasing morphism. A pattern…

We identify the structure of the lexicographically least word avoiding 5/4-powers on the alphabet of nonnegative integers. Specifically, we show that this word has the form $p \tau(\varphi(z) \varphi^2(z) \cdots)$ where $p, z$ are finite…

We implement a decision procedure for answering questions about a class of infinite words that might be called (for lack of a better name) "Fibonacci-automatic". This class includes, for example, the famous Fibonacci word f = 01001010...,…

A word $w$ is said to contain the pattern $P$ if there is a way to substitute a nonempty word for each letter in $P$ so that the resulting word is a subword of $w$. Bean, Ehrenfeucht and McNulty and, independently, Zimin characterised the…

A \emph{tangram} is a word in which every letter occurs an even number of times. Such word can be cut into parts that can be arranged into two identical words. The minimum number of cuts needed is called the \emph{cut number} of a tangram.…

Two $k$-ary Fibonacci recurrences are $a_k(n) = a_k(n-1) + k \cdot a_k(n-2)$ and $b_k(n) = k \cdot b_k(n-1) + b_k(n-2)$. We provide a simple proof that $a_k(n)$ is the number of $k$-regular words over $[n] = \{1,2,\ldots,n\}$ that avoid…

We introduce the notion of general prints of a word, which is substantialized by certain canonical decompositions, to study repetition in words. These associated decompositions, when applied recursively on a word, result in what we term as…

We show that the number of length-n words over a k-letter alphabet having no even palindromic prefix is the same as the number of length-n unbordered words, by constructing an explicit bijection between the two sets. A slightly different…

We characterize the squares occurring in infinite overlap-free binary words and construct various alpha power-free binary words containing infinitely many overlaps.

We present four constructions of inversion sequences, and use them to compute the enumeration sequences of 24 classes of pattern-avoiding inversion sequences. This completes the enumeration of inversion sequences avoiding one or two…

The complement $\overline{x}$ of a binary word $x$ is obtained by changing each $0$ in $x$ to $1$ and vice versa. We study infinite binary words $\bf w$ that avoid sufficiently large complementary factors; that is, if $x$ is a factor of…

In combinatorics on words, a word $w$ over an alphabet $\Sigma$ is said to avoid a pattern $p$ over an alphabet $\Delta$ if there is no factor $f$ of $w$ such that $f= (p)$ where $h: \Delta^*\to\Sigma^*$ is a non-erasing morphism. A pattern…

We prove that the `connective constant' for ternary square-free words is at least $2^{1/17} = 1.0416 ... $, improving on Brinkhuis and Brandenburg's lower bounds of $2^{1/24}=1.0293 ...$ and $2^{1/22}=1.032 ...$ respectively. This is the…

This paper considers the enumeration of ternary trees (i.e. rooted ordered trees in which each vertex has 0 or 3 children) avoiding a contiguous ternary tree pattern. We begin by finding recurrence relations for several simple tree…

We construct an infinite word $w$ over the $5$-letter alphabet such that for every factor $f$ of $w$ of length at least two, there exists a cyclic permutation of $f$ that is not a factor of $w$. In other words, $w$ does not contain a…

Words whose three successive factors of the same length are all different i.e. 3-anti-power words are a natural extension of square-free words (two successive factors of the same length are different). We give a way to verify whether a…

Let $D^+$ be the first octant of the Euclidean space and consider the integral cube grid $G$ in $D^+$. The intersections of each line with $G$ form an infinite sequence of three letters which can be considered as an extension of well-known…

The (bitwise) complement $\overline{x}$ of a binary word $x$ is obtained by changing each $0$ in $x$ to $1$ and vice versa. An $\textit{antisquare}$ is a nonempty word of the form $x\, \overline{x}$. In this paper, we study infinite binary…