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Pham 2024 sharp bound erdos straus non averaging

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theorem_1: The sharp upper bound for non-averaging sets, which also bounds non-dividing sets from above.


Huy Tuan Pham, Dmitrii Zakharov, Sharp bound for the Erdős-Straus non-averaging set problem. Geom. Funct. Anal. 35 (2025), no. 6, 1712--1738, DOI 10.1007/s00039-025-00728-8 (published online 3 December 2025; Crossref record read). arXiv:2410.14624. The arXiv record names arXiv's non-exclusive distribution license (arXiv:2410.14624), every other right reserved; that is the term of the arXiv v2 read here. The journal's version of record is under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license: its Crossref record (https://api.crossref.org/works/10.1007/s00039-025-00728-8, read 2026-10-07) deposits https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 for the version of record from 3 December 2025.

Pham and Zakharov prove that a non-averaging subset of {1,...,n} (no element is the average of a nonempty subset of the other elements) has at most n^{1/4+o(1)} elements; with Bosznay's construction this fixes the maximum at n^{1/4+o(1)} and settles the Erdos-Straus non-averaging set problem. For each fixed d they also find how large a non-averaging set inside a d-dimensional box can be. The proof combines the subset-sums structure theorem of Conlon, Fox and Pham with a result on point sets in nearly convex position. The copy read for this card is arXiv:2410.14624v2 (10 September 2025, 20 pp.), whose pagination is used here; the journal text was not compared. Read status: claims checked for the definition of a non-averaging set and Theorem 1 (p. 2, |A| <= n^{1/4+o(1)} for every non-averaging A in [n], so h(n) = n^{1/4+o(1)}), read in the text layer; the proof was not read. Result page: theorem_1. For problem 789 it is context only: it resolves the sibling non-averaging problem (Problem 186; arXiv 2024, Geom. Funct. Anal. 2025) and states no bound for the different quantity in 789.

Source: https://arxiv.org/abs/2410.14624.

Bears on. #789, #131 (a set in which no element divides the sum of any distinct other elements is non-averaging, so Theorem 1 gives F(N)≤N1/4+o(1)F(N)\le N^{1/4+o(1)} for the problem's F(N)F(N), answering its displayed question F(N)>N1/2−o(1)F(N)>N^{1/2-o(1)} in the negative; the order of F(N)F(N) stays open), #186: Theorem 1 (p. 2 of arXiv v2, text layer), ∣A∣≤n1/4+o(1)|A|\le n^{1/4+o(1)} for every non-averaging A⊆[n]A\subseteq[n], with Bosznay's h(n)=Ω(n1/4)h(n)=\Omega(n^{1/4}) recalled on p. 1, gives h(n)=n1/4+o(1)h(n)=n^{1/4+o(1)}; the paper's non-averaging condition is the problem's (a one-element subset averages to itself, so the problem's "at least two" and the paper's "average of a nonempty subset of AA not containing aa" (p. 1) agree), and h(n)h(n) is the problem's F(N)F(N), whose order of growth is thereby determined up to the o(1)o(1) in the exponent (theorem_1).

No file of this source is held: the arXiv v2 read here carries no license that permits its redistribution, and the journal's version of record, under CC BY 4.0, was not read; page numbers are those of the arXiv v2.