Arithmetic progressions and the primes - El Escorial lectures

Fix $k$ a positive integer, and let $\ell$ be coprime to $k$. Let $p(k,\ell)$ denote the smallest prime equivalent to $\ell \pmod{k}$, and set $P(k)$ to be the maximum of all the $p(k,\ell)$. We seek lower bounds for $P(k)$. In particular, we show that for almost every $k$ one has $P(k) \gg \phi(k) \log k \log_2 k \log_4 k / \log_3 k,$ answering a question of Ford, Green, Konyangin, Maynard, and Tao. We rely on their recent work on large gaps between primes. Our main new idea...

A reasonably complete theory of the approximation of an irrational by rational fractions whose numerators and denominators lie in prescribed arithmetic progressions is developed in this paper. Results are both, on the one hand, from a metrical and a non-metrical point of view and, on the other hand, from an asymptotic and also a uniform point of view. The principal novelty is a Khintchine type theorem for uniform approximation in this context. Some applications of this theory...

We consider the problem of determining the maximum cardinality of a subset containing no arithmetic progressions of length $k$ in a given set of size $n$. It is proved that it is sufficient, in a certain sense, to consider the interval $[1,\dots, n]$. The study continues the work of Koml\'os, Sulyok, and Szemer\'edi.

We prove that if a set is `large' in the sense of Erd\H{o}s, then it approximates arbitrarily long arithmetic progressions in a strong quantitative sense. More specifically, expressing the error in the approximation in terms of the gap length $\Delta$ of the progression, we improve a previous result of $o(\Delta)$ to $O(\Delta^\alpha)$ for any $\alpha \in (0,1)$.

We show that any subset of the natural numbers with positive logarithmic Banach density contains a set that is within a factor of two of a geometric progression, improving the bound on a previous result of the authors. Density conditions on subsets of the natural numbers that imply the existence of approximate powers of arithmetic progressions are developed and explored.

We examine the behavior of the number of $k$-term arithmetic progressions in a random subset of $\mathbb{Z}/n\mathbb{Z}$. We prove that if a set is chosen by including each element of $\mathbb{Z}/n\mathbb{Z}$ independently with constant probability $p$, then the resulting distribution of $k$-term arithmetic progressions in that set, while obeying a central limit theorem, does not obey a local central limit theorem. The methods involve decomposing the random variable into homo...

Let $r_k(n)$ denote the maximum cardinality of a set $A \subset \{1,2, \dots, n \}$ such that $A$ does not contain a $k$-term arithmetic progression. In this paper, we give a method of constructing such a set and prove the lower bound $n^{1-\frac{c_k}{k \ln k}} < r_k(n)$ where $k$ is prime, and $c_k \rightarrow 1$ as $k \rightarrow \infty$. This bound is the best known for an increasingly large interval of $n$ as we choose larger and larger $k$. We also demonstrate that one c...

We prove an asymptotic formula for the number of integers $\leq x$ which can be written as the product of $k ~(\geq 2)$ distinct primes $p_1\cdots p_k$ with each prime factor in an arithmetic progression $p_j\equiv a_j \bmod q$, $(a_j, q)=1$ $(q \geq 3, 1\leq j\leq k)$. For any $A>0$, our result is uniform for $2\leq k\leq A\log\log x$. Moreover, we show that, there are large biases toward certain arithmetic progressions $(a_1 \bmod q, \cdots, a_k \bmod q)$, and such biases h...

Let $x,h$ and $Q$ be three parameters. We show that, for most moduli $q\le Q$ and for most positive real numbers $y\le x$, every reduced arithmetic progression $a\mod q$ has approximately the expected number of primes $p$ from the interval $(y,y+h]$, provided that $h>x^{1/6+\epsilon}$ and $Q$ satisfies appropriate bounds in terms of $h$ and $x$. Moreover, we prove that, for most moduli $q\le Q$ and for most positive real numbers $y\le x$, there is at least one prime $p\in(y,y...

A famous theorem of Szemer\'edi asserts that any set of integers of positive upper density will contain arbitrarily long arithmetic progressions. In its full generality, we know of four types of arguments that can prove this theorem: the original combinatorial (and graph-theoretical) approach of Szemer\'edi, the ergodic theory approach of Furstenberg, the Fourier-analytic approach of Gowers, and the hypergraph approach of Nagle-R\"odl-Schacht-Skokan and Gowers. In this lectur...