Related papers: On Erd\H{o}s sums of almost primes
It has been known since Erdos that the sum of $1/(n\log n)$ over numbers $n$ with exactly $k$ prime factors (with repetition) is bounded as $k$ varies. We prove that as $k$ tends to infinity, this sum tends to 1. Banks and Martin have…
Let $f(N)$ denote the least integer $k$ such that, if $G$ is an abelian group of order $N$ and $A \subseteq G$ is a uniformly random $k$-element subset, then with probability at least $\tfrac12$ the subset-sum set $\{ \sum_{x \in S} x : S…
Erd\H{o}s proved that $\mathcal{F}(A) := \sum_{a \in A}\frac{1}{a\log a}$ converges for any primitive set of integers $A$ and later conjectured this sum is maximized when $A$ is the set of primes. Banks and Martin further conjectured that…
Let $\mathbb{Z}^{+}$ be the set of positive integers. Let $C_{k}$ denote all subsets of $\mathbb{Z}^{+}$ such that neither of them contains $k + 1$ pairwise coprime integers and $C_k(n)=C_k\cap \{1,2,\ldots,n\}$. Let $f(n, k) =…
A strictly increasing sequence $\mathscr{A}$ of positive integers is said to be primitive if no term of $\mathscr{A}$ divides any other. Erd\H{o}s showed that the series $\sum_{a \in \mathscr{A}} \frac{1}{a \log a}$, where $\mathscr{A}$ is…
The basic theme of this paper is the fact that if $A$ is a finite set of integers, then the sum and product sets cannot both be small. A precise formulation of this fact is Conjecture 1 below due to Erd\H os-Szemer\'edi [E-S]. (see also…
We prove that if $f(n)$ is a Steinhaus or Rademacher random multiplicative function, there almost surely exist arbitrarily large values of $x$ for which $|\sum_{n \leq x} f(n)| \geq \sqrt{x} (\log\log x)^{1/4+o(1)}$. This is the first such…
The Erd\H{o}s primitive set conjecture states that the sum $f(A) = \sum_{a\in A}\frac{1}{a\log a}$, ranging over any primitive set $A$ of positive integers, is maximized by the set of prime numbers. Recently Laib, Derbal, and Mechik proved…
We improve upon a result of Steinerberger (2024) by demonstrating that for any fixed $k \in \mathbb{N}$ and sufficiently large $n$, there exist integers $1 \leq a_1, \dots, a_k \leq n$ satisfying: \begin{align*} 0 < \left\| \sum_{j=1}^{k}…
We prove that there are infinitely many $n$ such that $\omega(n+k) \ll \log k$ for all integers $k \ge 2$. This improves on a result of Tao-Ter\"{a}v\"{a}inen (2025), who has $O(k)$ in place of $O(\log k)$. As corollaries, we make progress…
Let $\Sigma=\{a_1, \ldots , a_n\}$ be a set of positive integers with $a_1 < \ldots < a_n$ such that all $2^n$ subset sums are pairwise distinct. A famous conjecture of Erd\H{o}s states that $a_n>C\cdot 2^n$ for some constant $C$, while the…
Let $\{p_j(n)\}_{j=1}^{\omega(n)}$ denote the increasing sequence of distinct prime factors of an integer $n$. We provide details for the proof of a statement of Erd\H{o}s implying that, for any function $\xi(n)$ tending to infinity with…
A set of positive integers is primitive (or 1-primitive) if no member divides another. Erd\H{o}s proved in 1935 that the weighted sum $\sum1/(n \log n)$ for $n$ ranging over a primitive set $A$ is universally bounded over all choices for…
We study the rate of growth of ergodic sums along a sequence (a_n) of times: S_N f(x)=f(T^{a_1}x) + ... + f(T^{a_N}x). We characterize the maximal rate of growth of these ergodic sums and identify a number of sequences such as (2^n) that…
In this paper we prove two results. The first theorem uses a paper of Kim \cite{K} to show that for fixed primes $p_1,...,p_k$, and for fixed integers $m_1,...,m_k$, with $p_i\not|m_i$, the numbers $(e_{p_1}(n),...,e_{p_k}(n))$ are…
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.
In this note we improve an algorithm from a recent paper by Bauer and Bennett for computing a function of Erd\"os that measures the minimal gap size $f(k)$ in the sequence of integers at least one of whose prime factors exceeds $k$. This…
Erd\H{o}s showed that every set of $n$ positive integers contains a subset of size at least $n/(k+1)$ containing no solutions to $x_1 + \cdots + x_k = y$. We prove that the constant $1/(k+1)$ here is best possible by showing that if $(F_m)$…
For $k\ge1$, a $k$-almost prime is a positive integer with exactly $k$ prime factors, counted with multiplicity. In this article we give elementary proofs of precise asymptotics for the reciprocal sum of $k$-almost primes. Our results match…
A set of natural numbers $A$ is called primitive if no element of $A$ divides any other. Let $\Omega(n)$ be the number of prime divisors of $n$ counted with multiplicity. Let $f_z(A) = \sum_{a \in A}\frac{z^{\Omega(a)}}{a (\log a)^z}$,…