English

On Petersson's partition limit formula

Number Theory 2020-12-01 v1

Abstract

For each prime p1(mod4)p\equiv 1\pmod{4} consider the Legendre character χ=(p)\chi=(\frac{\cdot}{p}). Let p±(n)p_\pm(n) be the number of partitions of nn into parts λ>0\lambda>0 such that χ(λ)=±1\chi(\lambda)=\pm 1. Petersson proved a beautiful limit formula for the ratio of p+(n)p_+(n) to p(n)p_-(n) as nn\to\infty expressed in terms of important invariants of the real quadratic field Q(p)\mathbb{Q}(\sqrt{p}). But his proof is not illuminating and Grosswald conjectured a more natural proof using a Tauberian converse of the Stolz-Ces\`aro theorem. In this paper we suggest an approach to address Grosswald's conjecture. We discuss a monotonicity conjecture which looks quite natural in the context of the monotonicity theorems of Bateman-Erd\H{o}s.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2011.14601,
  title  = {On Petersson's partition limit formula},
  author = {Carlos Castaño-Bernard and Florian Luca},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2011.14601},
  year   = {2020}
}

Comments

Online Ready - International Journal of Number Theory

R2 v1 2026-06-23T20:35:25.789Z