English

Kempner-like harmonic series

Number Theory 2024-03-25 v3

Abstract

Inspired by a question asked on the list {\tt mathfun}, we revisit {\em Kempner-like series}, i.e., harmonic sums 1/n\sum' 1/n where the integers nn in the summation have ``restricted'' digits. First we give a short proof that limk(s2(n)=k1/n)=2log2\lim_{k \to \infty}(\sum_{s_2(n) = k} 1/n) = 2 \log 2, where s2(n)s_2(n) is the sum of the binary digits of the integer nn. Then we propose two generalizations. One generalization addresses the case where s2(n)s_2(n) is replaced with sb(n)s_b(n), the sum of bb-ary digits in base bb: we prove that limksb(n)=k1/n=(2logb)/(b1)\lim_{k \to \infty}\sum_{s_b(n) = k} 1/n = (2 \log b)/(b-1). The second generalization replaces the sum of digits in base 22 with any block-counting function in base 22, e.g., the function a(n)a(n) of -- possibly overlapping -- 1111's in the base-22 expansion of nn, for which we obtain limka(n)=k1/n=4log2\lim_{k \to \infty}\sum_{a(n) = k} 1/n = 4 \log 2.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2305.18180,
  title  = {Kempner-like harmonic series},
  author = {Jean-Paul Allouche and Claude Morin},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2305.18180},
  year   = {2024}
}

Comments

A slightly shorter version has been accepted by the American Mathematical Monthly

R2 v1 2026-06-28T10:49:23.317Z