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The peak sidelobe level of random binary sequences

Combinatorics 2014-03-18 v2 Information Theory math.IT

Abstract

Let An=(a0,a1,,an1)A_n=(a_0,a_1,\dots,a_{n-1}) be drawn uniformly at random from {1,+1}n\{-1,+1\}^n and define M(An)=max0<u<nj=0nu1ajaj+ufor n>1. M(A_n)=\max_{0<u<n}\,\Bigg|\sum_{j=0}^{n-u-1}a_ja_{j+u}\Bigg|\quad\text{for $n>1$}. It is proved that M(An)/nlognM(A_n)/\sqrt{n\log n} converges in probability to 2\sqrt{2}. This settles a problem first studied by Moon and Moser in the 1960s and proves in the affirmative a recent conjecture due to Alon, Litsyn, and Shpunt. It is also shown that the expectation of M(An)/nlognM(A_n)/\sqrt{n\log n} tends to 2\sqrt{2}.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1105.5178,
  title  = {The peak sidelobe level of random binary sequences},
  author = {Kai-Uwe Schmidt},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1105.5178},
  year   = {2014}
}

Comments

minor revisions and corrections compared to the first version

R2 v1 2026-06-21T18:12:49.600Z