Related papers: Nice formulas, $xyx$-formulas, and palindrome patt…

How long can a word be that avoids the unavoidable? Word $W$ encounters word $V$ provided there is a homomorphism $\phi$ defined by mapping letters to nonempty words such that $\phi(V)$ is a subword of $W$. Otherwise, $W$ is said to avoid…

We consider three aspects of avoiding large squares in infinite binary words. First, we construct an infinite binary word avoiding both cubes xxx and squares yy with |y| >= 4; our construction is somewhat simpler than the original…

In this note we present a characterisation of all unary and binary patterns that do not only contain variables, but also reversals of their instances. These types of variables were studied recently in either more general or particular…

A pattern is encountered in a word if some infix of the word is the image of the pattern under some non-erasing morphism. A pattern $p$ is unavoidable if, over every finite alphabet, every sufficiently long word encounters $p$. A theorem by…

The observed frequency of the longest proper prefix, the longest proper suffix, and the longest infix of a word $w$ in a given sequence $x$ can be used for classifying $w$ as avoided or overabundant. The definitions used for the expectation…

A permutation $\pi$ is said to avoid a chain $(\sigma:\tau)$ of patterns if $\pi$ avoids $\sigma$ and $\pi^2$ avoids $\tau.$ In this paper, we define a notion of pattern avoidance for compositions of positive integers and use that idea to…

For $\alpha\geq 1$, an $\alpha$-gapped repeat in a word $w$ is a factor $uvu$ of $w$ such that $|uv|\leq \alpha |u|$; the two factors $u$ in such a repeat are called arms, while the factor $v$ is called gap. Such a repeat is called maximal…

The method we have applied in "A. Bernini, L. Ferrari, R. Pinzani, Enumerating permutations avoiding three Babson-Steingrimsson patterns, Ann. Comb. 9 (2005), 137--162" to count pattern avoiding permutations is adapted to words. As an…

Recently, Brualdi and Cao studied $I_k$-avoiding $(0,1)$-matrices by decomposing them into zigzag paths and proved that the maximum number of $1$'s in such a matrix is given by an exact formula. We further study the structure of maximal…

We study the palindromic complexity of infinite words $u_\beta$, the fixed points of the substitution over a binary alphabet, $\phi(0)=0^a1$, $\phi(1)=0^b1$, with $a-1\geq b\geq 1$, which are canonically associated with quadratic non-simple…

Motivated by the recent proof of the Stanley-Wilf conjecture, we study the asymptotic behavior of the number of permutations avoiding a generalized pattern. Generalized patterns allow the requirement that some pairs of letters must be…

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…

In this paper we study pattern avoidance for affine permutations. In particular, we show that for a given pattern p, there are only finitely many affine permutations in $\widetilde{S}_n$ that avoid p if and only if p avoids the pattern 321.…

We consider words $w$ over the alphabet $\Sigma=\{0,1,2\}$. It is shown that there are irreducibly square-free words of all lengths $n$ except 4,5,7 and 12. Such a word is square-free (i.e., it has no repetitions $uu$ as factors), but by…

In this note we study the {\em asymptotic popularity}, that is, the limit probability to find a given consecutive pattern at a random position in a random permutation in the eighteen classes of permutations avoiding at least two length 3…

Rich words are characterized by containing the maximum possible number of distinct palindromes. Several characteristic properties of rich words have been studied; yet the analysis of repetitions in rich words still involves some interesting…

For any positive integer $n$ along with parameters $\alpha$ and $\nu$, we define and investigate $\alpha$-shifted, $\nu$-offset, floor sequences of length $n$. We find exact and asymptotic formulas for the number of integers in such a…

Fix a strong rectangulation pattern $P$ of size $L$. We show that the growth constant of the class of strong rectangulations avoiding $P$ is strictly smaller than $\Lambda =27/2$, the growth constant for all strong rectangulations. More…

For a rational number $r$ such that $1<r\leq 2$, an undirected $r$-power is a word of the form $xyx'$, where the word $x$ is nonempty, the word $x'$ is in $\{x,x^R\}$, and we have $|xyx'|/|xy|=r$. The undirected repetition threshold for $k$…

Recently, B\'ona and Smith defined strong pattern avoidance, saying that a permutation $\pi$ strongly avoids a pattern $\tau$ if $\pi$ and $\pi^2$ both avoid $\tau$. They conjectured that for every positive integer $k$, there is a…