Related papers: On skew corner-free sets

We construct skew corner-free subsets of $[n]^2$ of size $n^2\exp(-O(\sqrt{\log n}))$, thereby improving on recent bounds of the form $\Omega(n^{5/4})$ obtained by Pohoata and Zakharov. In the other direction, we prove that any such set has…

A skew corner is a triple of points in $\mathbb{Z} \times \mathbb{Z}$ of the form $(x,y), (x, y + a)$ and $(x + a, y')$. Pratt posed the following question: how large can a set $A \subseteq [n] \times [n]$ be, provided it contains no…

Motivated by applications to matrix multiplication algorithms, Pratt asked (ITCS'24) how large a subset of $[n] \times [n]$ could be without containing a skew-corner: three points $(x,y), (x,y+h),(x+h,y')$ with $h \ne 0$. We prove any skew…

A corner is a set of three points in $\mathbf{Z}^2$ of the form $(x, y), (x + d, y), (x, y + d)$ with $d \neq 0$. We show that for infinitely many $N$ there is a set $A \subset [N]^2$ of size $2^{-(c + o(1)) \sqrt{\log_2 N}} N^2$ not…

A subset $A$ of the $k$-dimensional grid $\{1,2, \cdots, N\}^k$ is called $k$-dimensional corner-free if it does not contain a set of points of the form $\{ a \} \cup \{ a + de_i : 1 \leq i \leq k \}$ for some $a \in \{1,2, \cdots, N\}^k$…

Let $k$ and $n$ be fixed positive integers. For each prime power $q\geqslant k\geqslant 3$, we show that any subset $A\subseteq \mathbb{Z}_q^n$ free of $k$-term arithmetic progressions has size $|A|\leqslant c_k(q)^n$ with a constant…

We prove new lower bounds on the maximum size of sets $A\subseteq \mathbb{F}_p^n$ or $A\subseteq \mathbb{Z}_m^n$ not containing three-term arithmetic progressions (consisting of three distinct points). More specifically, we prove that for…

Every triangle-free planar graph on n vertices has an independent set of size at least (n+1)/3, and this lower bound is tight. We give an algorithm that, given a triangle-free planar graph G on n vertices and an integer k>=0, decides…

A set A is square-difference free (henceforth SDF) if there do not exist x,y\in A, x\ne y, such that |x-y| is a square. Let sdf(n) be the size of the largest SDF subset of {1,...,n}. Ruzsa has shown that sdf(n) = \Omega(n^{0.5(1+ \log_{65}…

Let $E\subset \mathbb R^n$, $n\ge 2$, be a set of finite perimeter with $|E|=|B|$, where $B$ denotes the unit ball. When $n=2$, since convexification decreases perimeter (in the class of open connected sets), it is easy to prove the…

In this paper, we proved that there are infinite cube--free numbers of the form $[n^c]$ for any fixed real number $1<c<11/6$.

We prove that a Kakeya set in a vector space over a finite field of size $q$ always supports a probability measure whose Fourier transform is bounded by $q^{-1}$ for all non-zero frequencies. We show that this bound is sharp in all…

A conjecture of Chung and Graham states that every $K_4$-free graph on $n$ vertices contains a vertex set of size $\lfloor n/2 \rfloor$ that spans at most $n^2/18$ edges. We make the first step toward this conjecture by showing that it…

Suppose that $S \subseteq [n]^2$ contains no three points of the form $(x,y), (x,y+\delta), (x+\delta,y')$, where $\delta \neq 0$. How big can $S$ be? Trivially, $n \le |S| \le n^2$. Slight improvements on these bounds are obtained from…

In this paper, we study the problem of finding the largest possible set of s points and s lines in a projective plane of order q, such that that none of the s points lie on any of the s lines. We prove that s <= 1+(q+1)(\sqrt{q}-1). We also…

Two words have a reverse if they have the same pair of distinct letters on the same pair of positions, but in reversed order. A set of words no two of which have a reverse is said to be reverse-free. Let F(n,k) be the maximum size of a…

A set without tangents in $\PG(2,q)$ is a set of points S such that no line meets S in exactly one point. An exterior set of a conic $\mathcal{C}$ is a set of points $\E$ such that all secant lines of $\E$ are external lines of…

A skew shape is the difference of two top-left justified Ferrers shapes sharing the same top-left corner. We study integer fillings of skew shapes. As our first main result, we show that for a specific hereditary class of skew shapes, which…

The convexity number of a set $X \subset \mathbb{R}^2$ is the minimum number of convex subsets required to cover it. We study the following question: what is the largest possible convexity number $f(n)$ of $\mathbb{R}^2 \setminus S$, where…

We define and study a class of subshifts of finite type (SFTs) defined by a family of allowed patterns of the same shape where, for any contents of the shape minus a corner, the number of ways to fill in the corner is the same. The main…