Related papers: On further questions regarding unit fractions

Erd\H{o}s and Graham proposed to determine the number of subsets $S \subseteq \left\{1,2,\dots,n\right\}$ with $\sum_{s \in S} 1/s = 1$ and asked, among other things, whether that number could be as large as $2^{n - o(n)}$. We show that the…

We prove that any set $A\subset \mathbb{N}$ of positive upper density contains a finite $S\subset A$ such that $\sum_{n\in S}\frac{1}{n}=1$, answering a question of Erd\H{o}s and Graham.

We prove an old conjecture of Erd{\H o}s and Graham on sums of unit fractions: There exists a constant $b>0$ such that if we $r$-color the integers in $2,b^r]$, then there exists a monochromatic set $S$ such that $\sum_{n \in S} 1/n=1$.

A conjecture of Graham (repeated by Erd\H{o}s) asserts that for any set $A \subseteq \mathbb{F}_p \setminus \{0\}$, there is an ordering $a_1, \ldots, a_{|A|}$ of the elements of $A$ such that the partial sums $a_1, a_1+a_2, \ldots,…

The Erd\H{o}s-Straus conjecture is a renowned problem which describes that for every natural number $n~(\ge 2)$, $\frac{4}{n}$ can be represented as the sum of three unit fractions. The main purpose of this study is to show that the…

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…

Hardy showed that $\sum_{n \ioe x}\tau(n)-x(\log x +2\gamma -1)$ is not $o(x^{1/4})$. In this article, we prove that $\sum_{n \ioe x}\tau(n)(1-\frac{x}{n})-xP(\log x)=\frac{1}{4}+O \left( \frac{\log x}{x^{1/4}} \right)$, where $P$ is a…

Let $d(n)$ be the divisor function and denote by $[t]$ the integral part of the real number $t$. In this paper, we prove that $$\sum_{n\leq x^{1/c}}d\left(\left[\frac{x}{n^c}\right]\right)=d_cx^{1/c}+\mathcal{O}_{\varepsilon,c}…

We prove new upper bounds on the number of representations of rational numbers $\frac{m}{n}$ as a sum of $4$ unit fractions, giving five different regions, depending on the size of $m$ in terms of $n$. In particular, we improve the most…

Let $t(N)$ denote the largest number such that $N!$ can be expressed as the product of $N$ integers greater than or equal to $t(N)$. The bound $t(N)/N = 1/e-o(1)$ was apparently established in unpublished work of Erd\H{o}s, Selfridge, and…

From the Rhind Papyrus and other extant sources, we know that the ancient Egyptians were very iterested in expressing a given fraction into a sum of unit fractions, that is fractions whose numerators are equal to 1. One of the problems that…

It is proved that for any non-empty finite subset $Q$ of the square numbers, $ |Q+Q|\geq C'|Q|(\log |Q|)^{1/3+o(1)} $. This result essentially is proved -- with the same tools -- by Mei-Chu Chang. See in J. Funct. Anal. 207 (2004), no 2,…

We prove the following variant of the Erd\H{o}s distinct subset sums problem. Given $t \ge 0$ and sufficiently large $n$, every $n$-element set $A$ whose subset sums are distinct modulo $N=2^n+t$ satisfies $$\max A \ge…

A 1971 conjecture of Graham (later repeated by Erd\H{o}s and Graham) asserts that every set $A \subseteq \mathbb{F}_p \setminus \{0\}$ has an ordering whose partial sums are all distinct. We prove this conjecture for sets of size $|A|…

We prove new upper bounds for the number of representations of an arbitrary rational number as a sum of three unit fractions. In particular, for fixed $m$ there are at most $\mathcal{O}_{\epsilon}(n^{3/5+\epsilon})$ solutions of…

A famous conjecture of Erd\H os and Straus is that for every integer $n\ge2$, $4/n$ can be represented as $1/x+1/y+1/z$, where $x,y,z$ are positive integers. This conjecture was generalized to $5/n$ by Sierpi\'nski, and then Schinzel…

Let $\{a_1, . . . , a_n\}$ be a set of positive integers with $a_1 < \dots < a_n$ such that all $2^n$ subset sums are distinct. A famous conjecture by Erd\H{o}s states that $a_n>c\cdot 2^n$ for some constant $c$, while the best result known…

Let $f(n)$ be a Steinhaus random multiplicative function. Let $A\subset [1, N]$ be a finite set of integers. We show that \[\frac{1}{\sqrt{|A|}} \sum_{n\in A} f(n) \xrightarrow[]{d} \mathcal{CN}(0,1)\] forces that $|A|=o(N)$. We prove that…

We introduce a natural definition for sums of the form \[ \sum_{\nu=1}^x f(\nu) \] when the number of terms x is a rather arbitrary real or even complex number. The resulting theory includes the known interpolation of the factorial by the…

One is expressed as the sum of the reciprocals of a certain set of integers. We give an elegant proof to the fact applying the polynomial theorem and basic calculus.