Related papers: On a problem involving unit fractions

A $k\ell$-subset partition, or $(k,\ell)$-subpartition, is a $k\ell$-subset of an $n$-set that is partitioned into $\ell$ distinct classes, each of size $k$. Two $(k,\ell)$-subpartitions are said to $t$-intersect if they have at least $t$…

Let $G=(V(G),E(G))$ be a graph with set of vertices $V(G)$ and set of edges $E(G)$. A subset $S$ of $E(G)$ is called a $k$-nearly independent edge subsets if there are exactly $k$ pairs of elements of $S$ that share a common end. $Z_k(G)$…

We present algorithms for length-constrained maximum sum segment and maximum density segment problems, in particular, and the problem of finding length-constrained heaviest segments, in general, for a sequence of real numbers. Given a…

A vertex labeling of a hypergraph is sum distinguishing if it uses positive integers and the sums of labels taken over the distinct hyperedges are distinct. Let s(H) be the smallest integer N such that there is a sum-distinguishing labeling…

In the Equal-Subset-Sum problem, we are given a set $S$ of $n$ integers and the problem is to decide if there exist two disjoint nonempty subsets $A,B \subseteq S$, whose elements sum up to the same value. The problem is NP-complete. The…

Let $\displaystyle \sum_{i=a}^b \frac{1}{i} = \frac{u_{a,b}}{v_{a,b}}$ with $u_{a,b}$ and $v_{a,b}$ coprime. Erd\H{o}s and Graham asked the following: Does there, for every fixed $a$, exist a $b$ such that $v_{a,b} < v_{a,b-1}$? If so, what…

Let $k \ge 2$ and $s$ be positive integers, and let $n$ be a large positive integer subject to certain local conditions. We prove that if $s \ge k^2+k+1$ and $\theta > 31/40$, then $n$ can be expressed as a sum $p_1^k + \dots + p_s^k$,…

A system of distinct representatives (SDR) of a family $F = (A_1, \cdots, A_n)$ is a sequence $(x_1, \cdots, x_n)$ of $n$ distinct elements with $x_i \in A_i$ for $1 \le i \le n$. Let $N(F)$ denote the number of SDRs of a family $F$; two…

In [5] Graham and Rothschild consider a geometric Ramsey problem: finding the least n such that if all edges of the complete graph on the points {+1,-1}^n are 2-colored, there exist 4 coplanar points such that the 6 edges between them are…

Let $k \in \mathbb{N}$ and suppose we are given $k$ integers $1 \leq a_1, \dots, a_k \leq n$. If $\sqrt{a_1} + \dots + \sqrt{a_k}$ is not an integer, how close can it be to one? When $k=1$, the distance to the nearest integer is $\gtrsim…

Let ${\Bbb F}_2$ be the finite field of two elements, ${\Bbb F}_2^n$ be the vector space of dimension $n$ over ${\Bbb F}_2$. For sets $A,\,B\subseteq{\Bbb F}_2^n$, their sumset is defined as the set of all pairwise sums $a+b$ with $a\in…

Let $s(n)$ be the minimum number of edges in a graph that contains every $n$-vertex tree as a subgraph. Chung and Graham [J. London Math. Soc. 1983] claim to prove that $s(n)\leqslant O(n\log n)$. We point out a mistake in their proof. The…

For g $\ge$ 0, let n g denote the number of numerical semi-groups of genus g. A conjecture by Maria Bras-Amor\'os in 2008 states that the inequality n g $\ge$ n g--1 + n g--2 should hold for all g $\ge$ 2. Here we show that such an…

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.

Erd\H{o}s and Graham (Erd\H{o}s and Graham, 1980) asked if there exists an $n$ such that the divisors of $n$ greater than 1 are the moduli of a distinct covering system with the following property: If there exists an integer which satisfies…

Let S=(s_1,s_2,..., s_m) and T = (t_1,t_2,..., t_n) be vectors of non-negative integers with sum_{i=1}^{m} s_i = sum_{j=1}^n t_j. Let B(S,T) be the number of m*n matrices over {0,1} with j-th row sum equal to s_j for 1 <= j <= m and k-th…

The subset sum problem is known to be an NP-hard problem in the field of computer science with the fastest known approach having a run-time complexity of $O(2^{0.3113n})$. A modified version of this problem is known as the perfect sum…

A well-known conjecture of Erd\H{o}s and S\'os states that every graph with average degree exceeding $m-1$ contains every tree with $m$ edges as a subgraph. We propose a variant of this conjecture, which states that every graph of maximum…

Let $s(n)$ be the number of different remainders $n \bmod k$, where $1 \leq k \leq \lfloor n/2 \rfloor$. This rather natural sequence is sequence A283190 in the OEIS and while some basic facts are known, it seems that surprisingly it has…

We present a new FPTAS for the Subset Sum Ratio problem, which, given a set of integers, asks for two disjoint subsets such that the ratio of their sums is as close to $1$ as possible. Our scheme makes use of exact and approximate…