Related papers: Necklaces, subset sums, and cyclic permutations

In this paper we study some sophisticated supercongruences involving dual sequences. For $n=0,1,2,\ldots$ define $$d_n(x)=\sum_{k=0}^n\binom nk\binom xk2^k$$ and $$s_n(x)=\sum_{k=0}^n\binom nk\binom xk\binom{x+k}k=\sum_{k=0}^n\binom…

It is known that there are no more Lyndon words of length n than there are periodic necklaces of same length. This paper considers a similar problem where, additionally, the necklaces must be without some forbidden factors. This problem…

Reducing the conditions under which a given set satisfies the stipulations of the subset sum proposition to a set of linear relationships, the question of whether a set satisfies subset sum may be answered in a polynomial number of steps by…

It is a classical fact that every $n$-element set of positive reals has at least $\binom{n+1}{2}+1$ distinct subset sums, with equality exactly for homogeneous arithmetic progressions (when $n\geq 4$). We establish stability versions of…

The problem of efficiently characterizing degree sequences of simple hypergraphs is a fundamental long-standing open problem in Graph Theory. Several results are known for restricted versions of this problem. This paper adds to the list of…

Let $m, n$ be positive integers such that $m>1$ divides $n$. In this paper, we introduce a special class of piecewise-affine permutations of the finite set $[1, n]:=\{1, \ldots, n\}$ with the property that the reduction $\pmod m$ of $m$…

We prove several versions of N. Alon's "necklace-splitting theorem", subject to additional constraints, as illustrated by the following results. (1) The "almost equicardinal necklace-splitting theorem" claims that, without increasing the…

The well-known "necklace splitting theorem" of Alon asserts that every $k$-colored necklace can be fairly split into $q$ parts using at most $t$ cuts, provided $k(q-1)\leq t$. In a joint paper with Alon et al. we studied a kind of opposite…

A complementary Gray code for binary n-tuples is one that, when all the tuples are complemented, is identical to itself; this is equivalent to the complement of the first half of the code being identical to the second half. We generalize…

In this paper, we first obtain some analogues of a formula of Zagier (1995) and Stanley (2011). For instance, we prove that the number of pairs of $n$-cycles whose product has $k$ cycles and has $m$ given elements contained in distinct…

It is known that any open necklace with beads of $t$ types in which the number of beads of each type is divisible by $k$, can be partitioned by at most $(k-1)t$ cuts into intervals that can be distributed into $k$ collections, each…

A circular word, or a necklace, is an equivalence class under conjugation of a word. A fundamental question concerning regularities in standard words is bounding the number of distinct squares in a word of length $n$. The famous conjecture…

This work is about a partition problem which is an instance of the distance magic graph labeling problem. Given positive integers $n,k$ and $p_1\le p_2\le \cdots\le p_k$ such that $p_1+\cdots+p_k=n$ and $k$ divides $\sum_{i=1}^ni$, we study…

With help of $q$-congruence, we prove the divisibility of some binomial sums. For example, for any integers $\rho,n\geq 2$, $$\sum_{k=0}^{n-1}(4k+1) \binom{2k}{k}^\rho \cdot (-4)^{\rho(n-1-k)} \equiv 0\pmod{2^{\rho-2}n\binom{2n}{n}}.$$

For any positive integers $k,r,n$ with $r \leq \min\{k,n\}$, let $\mathcal{P}_{k,r,n}$ be the family of all sets $\{(x_1,y_1), \dots, (x_r,y_r)\}$ such that $x_1, \dots, x_r$ are distinct elements of $[k] = \{1, \dots, k\}$ and $y_1, \dots,…

Define the complete n-complex on N vertices to be the n-skeleton of an (N-1)-simplex. We show that embeddings of sufficiently large complete n-complexes in R^{2n+1} necessarily exhibit complicated linking behaviour, thereby extending known…

Ezra Getzler notes in the proof of the main theorem of "The semi-classical approximation for modular operads" that "A proof of the theorem could no doubt be given using [a combinatorial interpretation in terms of a sum over necklaces];…

We continue the study of Adin, Alon and Roichman [arXiv:2502.14398, 2025] on the number of steps required to sort $n$ labelled points on a circle by transpositions. Imagine that the vertices of a cycle of length $n$ are labelled by the…

Pilz's conjecture states that for any finite set $A=\{a_1,a_2,\dots,a_k\}$ of positive integers and positive integer $n$ in the union of the sets $\{a_1,2a_1,\dots,na_1\},\dots, \{a_k,2a_k,\dots,na_k\}$ (considered as a multiset) at least…

Noting that cycle diagrams of permutations visually resemble grid diagrams used to depict knots and links in topology, we consider the knot (or link) obtained from the cycle diagram of a permutation. We show that the permutations which…