English

Generating functions for compositions with constrained even parts

Combinatorics 2026-02-25 v1

Abstract

We study compositions of a positive integer nn in which the occurrence of even parts larger than a fixed threshold kk is controlled. More precisely, for each composition m=(m1,,mr)m=(m_1,\dots,m_r) we consider the number of even parts strictly larger than kk, and we introduce a two-variable generating function that encodes this statistic. We show that this generating function is rational and obtain explicit closed forms, depending on the parity of kk. As a consequence, we derive exact counting formulas and linear recurrence relations for the number of compositions of nn with a prescribed number of even parts greater than kk. We also obtain explicit formulas for related refined quantities, such as the number of compositions with an even or odd number of such parts, the total number of their occurrences among all compositions of nn, and positional statistics describing how late the first such part appears in a composition. This combinatorial problem is motivated by questions arising from combinatorial expansions related to zeta functions of algebraic curves over finite fields, although the results of this paper are entirely combinatorial.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2602.20625,
  title  = {Generating functions for compositions with constrained even parts},
  author = {Mahdi Koutchoukali},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2602.20625},
  year   = {2026}
}
R2 v1 2026-07-01T10:49:28.441Z