Related papers: Partitioning permutations into monotone subsequenc…

This paper investigates the impossibility of certain $({n^2+n+k}_{n+1})$ configurations. Firstly, for $k=2$, the result of \cite{gropp1992non} that $\frac{n^2+n}{2}$ is even and $n+1$ is a perfect square or $\frac{n^2+n}{2}$ is odd and…

We show that if $A=\{a_1,a_2,..., a_k\}$ is a monotone increasing set of numbers, and the differences of the consecutive elements are all distinct, then $|A+B|\geq c|A|^{1/2}|B|$ for any finite set of numbers $B$. The bound is tight up to…

Answering a question of Cameron, Pretzel and Siemons proved that every integer partition of $n\ge 2(k+3)(k+1)$ can be reconstructed from its set of $k$-deletions. We describe a new reconstruction algorithm that lowers this bound to $n\ge…

Inspired by work of McKay, Morse, and Wilf, we give an exact count of the involutions in S_n which contain a given permutation \tau in S_k as a subsequence; this number depends on the patterns of the first j values of \tau for 1<=j<=k. We…

Generalizing a problem posed by Cover, we propose an adversarial game in which a permutation is incrementally constructed in a setting of partial information. As in the secretary problem, this permutation is exposed in stages via the…

A plank is the part of space between two parallel planes. The following open problem, posed 45 years ago, can be viwed as the converse of Tarski's plank problem (Bang's theorem): Is it true that if the total width of a collection of planks…

We prove that for every number k each countable infinite group $G$ admits a partition $G=A\cup B$ into two sets which are $k$-meager in the sense that for every $k$-element subset $K\subset G$ the sets $KA$ and $KB$ are not thick. The proof…

A set X of partial words over a finite alphabet A is called unavoidable if every two-sided infinite word over A has a factor compatible with an element of X. Unlike the case of a set of words without holes, the problem of deciding whether…

Let $f(n)$ denote the maximum sum of the side lengths of $n$ non-overlapping squares packed inside a unit square. We prove that $f(n^2+1) = n$ for all positive integers $n$ if and only if the sum $\sum_{k\geq 1}(f(k^2+1)-k)$ converges. We…

We study the maximum multiplicity $\mathcal{M}(k,n)$ of a simple transposition $s_k=(k \: k+1)$ in a reduced word for the longest permutation $w_0=n \: n-1 \: \cdots \: 2 \: 1$, a problem closely related to much previous work on sorting…

We prove that every $n$-letter word over $k$-letter alphabet contains some word as a subsequence in at least $k^{n/4k(1+o(1))}$ many ways, and that this is sharp as $k\to\infty$. For fixed $k$, we show that the analogous number deviates…

Let $P$ be a partially ordered set. We prove that if $n$ is sufficiently large, then there exists a packing $\mathcal{P}$ of copies of $P$ in the Boolean lattice $(2^{[n]},\subset)$ that covers almost every element of $2^{[n]}$:…

Define a permutation $\sigma$ to be coprime if $\gcd(m,\sigma(m)) = 1$ for $m\in[n]$. In this note, proving a recent conjecture of Pomerance, we prove that the number of coprime permutations on $[n]$ is $n!\cdot (c+o(1))^n$ where \[c =…

A packing by a body $K$ is collection of congruent copies of $K$ (in either Euclidean or hyperbolic space) so that no two copies intersect nontrivially in their interiors. A covering by $K$ is a collection of congruent copies of $K$ such…

We formalize symmetry breaking as a set-covering problem. For the case of breaking symmetries on graphs, a permutation covers a graph if applying it to the graph yields a smaller graph in a given order. Canonical graphs are those that…

We introduce the $k$-variable-occurrence fragment, which is the set of terms having at most $k$ occurrences of variables. We give a sufficient condition for the decidability of the equational theory of the $k$-variable-occurrence fragment…

In a parameterized problem, every instance I comes with a positive integer k. The problem is said to admit a polynomial kernel if, in polynomial time, one can reduce the size of the instance I to a polynomial in k, while preserving the…

In this note we define circular k-successions in permutations in one-line notation and count permutations that avoid substrings j(j+k) and j(j+k) (mod n). We also count circular permutations that avoid such substrings, and show that for…

Let $R(n,k)$ denote the number of permutations of ${1,2,...,n}$ with $k$ alternating runs. In this note we present an explicit formula for the numbers $R(n,k)$.

A permutation p is realized by the shift on N symbols if there is an infinite word on an N-letter alphabet whose successive left shifts by one position are lexicographically in the same relative order as p. The set of realized permutations…