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I'm looking for characteristics of the solutions for $$1-2^z+3^z-4^z=0$$ with $z\in\mathbb{C}$.

I want to compare it with the simple case $1-2^z=0$. The problem is, that I haven‘t the technical possibility to check this, therefore this post.

Can somebody help me to find out, if

(1) there are infinite complex zeroes (I think so) ,

(2) the real part of all complex zeroes ($\neq 0$) is the same (here: $\Re(z)\neq 0$ is constant and maybe negative) .

[Addition: Also the solutions of $1+2^z+3^z+4^z=0$ are interesting.]

Thanks in advance.

user90369
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  • Can you find at least one (approximate) zero? – Santiago Sep 01 '16 at 11:30
  • This doesn't belong to my question. It's not necessary to know the values. I only need to know, if the real part are always the same (constant), the value(s) are uninteresting (for me). – user90369 Sep 01 '16 at 12:06
  • I was afraid that there are no complex solutions to your equations, but it seems that mercio showed their existence. – Santiago Sep 01 '16 at 12:31
  • Yes, he has shown it. But I have still a problem to understand why all the real parts of the solutions cannot be the same. – user90369 Sep 01 '16 at 12:36

1 Answers1

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Yes there are infinitely many zeroes, and no their real parts aren't all the same.

If $r_- < 0$ is the solution to $1 = 2^r+3^r+4^r$ and $r_+ > 0$ is the solution to $4^r = 1+2^r+3^r$, then you have $|1-2^z+3^z-4^z| \ge 1 - (|2^z|+|3^z|+|4^z|) > 0$ for $\Re(z) < r_-$ and $|1-2^z+3^z-4^z| \ge |4^z| - (1+|2^z|+|3^z|) > 0$ for $\Re(z) > r_+$, and so the solutions are located in the vertical band $r_- \le \Re(z) \le r_+$.

Using the residue theorem from complex analysis, the number of solutions with $|\Im(z)| \le Y$ is $\frac 1 {2i\pi}\int_{\gamma(Y)} \frac {f'(z)}{f(z)} dz$ where $\gamma(Y)$ is any rectangular contour whose top and bottom edges are at $\Im(z) = \pm Y$, and the left and right edges are beyond $r_-$ and $r_+$.

The integral on the left edge gets as close to $0$ as you want when you move it enough to the left, the integral on the right edge gets to $2iY\log(4)$ which gives a contribution of $Y\log(4)/\pi$.
Meanwhile, the integral on the horizontal edges give a mostly real contribution when $\Re(z)$ is away from $[r_-;r_+]$, which doesn't add anything to the count.

If you expect that $\int_{r_-+iY}^{r_++iY} \frac {f'(z)}{f(z)}dz$ is bounded as $Y$ varies, you should have that the number of zeros in the band with imaginary part bounded by $Y$ is $Y \log(4)/\pi + O(1)$.

In the case where you have one less exponential term, one can show that the sequence of the real parts behave like a pseudo-random sequence whose distribution have an explicit closed-form, but here I'm really not sure if that's still the case. Since $\log 4 / \log 2$ is rational, in fact there is still a chance that there is something.


Here is an argument showing that $r_-$ is the best limit :

Since $\log(2)/\log(3)$ is irrational it's possible to find a $y$ such that $y\log(2) \approx 0 \pmod {2\pi}$ and $y\log(3) \approx \pi \pmod {2\pi}$ : just try all the $y = 2k\pi/\log(2)$. Then $\log(3)y = 2k\pi\log3/\log(2)$. Since the sequence $(k\log(3)/\log(2) \pmod 1$ is dense in the unit interval, it gets arbitrarily close to $1/2$. So there is a sequence $(y_n)$ such that $y_n\log(2) = 0 \pmod {2\pi}$ and $\varepsilon_n = (y_n\log(3) \pmod {2\pi}) - \pi \to 0$.

Now take $z$ near $z_n = r_- + iy_n$, i.e. $z = (r_-+iy_n)+dz$.
Doing a development at order $1$ and using $1-2^{r_-}-3^{r_-}-4^{r_-} = 0$, we have $f(z) = 1 - 2^z + 3^z - 4^z = (- \log 2. 2^{r_-} - \log 3. 3^{r_-} - \log 4. 4^{r_-}) dz - \log 3. 3^{r_-}(i\varepsilon_n) + O((dz,\varepsilon_n)^2)$

Now if you have $z$ move in a tiny circle around $z_n$ and if $\varepsilon_n$ is small enough, the error term on that circle is too small compared to this approximation of $f(z)$, which shows that they have the same number of zeroes (exactly one) .

The $r_+$ bound is also the best, this time you want to have $2^z$ and $3^r$ almost a negative real simultaneously. Then $4^z$ is almost a positive real and you are in the situation where $1,-2^z,-3^z$ are aligned against $-4^z$

mercio
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  • What is $f$ here? – Santiago Sep 01 '16 at 11:46
  • $f(z) = 1- 2^z+3^z-4^z$ – mercio Sep 01 '16 at 11:49
  • Thanks for your efforts! You have answered my first question, very nice considerations. - But still I haven't understand well, why the real parts aren't all the same (beside that this would be very unlikely). – user90369 Sep 01 '16 at 12:15
  • I'm not sure if one can find a "nice" reason, but maybe seeing a graph of $f$ would give you a better picture. – mercio Sep 01 '16 at 12:30
  • Yes, that's right. Thanks again. – user90369 Sep 01 '16 at 12:37
  • The second part of your further considerations are also very interesting. I still have to check if I understand everything. – user90369 Sep 01 '16 at 14:10
  • I have a problem with "the best limit". Your argumentation is the same, if one extends the alternating sums, e.g. if I use $1-2^x+3^x-4^x+5^x-6^x$. For this sum (till $6^x$) the values $-r_{-}$ and $r_{+}$ are greater than the values $-r_{-}$ and $r_{+}$ for the sum till $4^x$. If the sum is unlimited ($\rightarrow \zeta(x)$) one gets the best limits $-\infty$ and $+\infty$ which doesn't make sense. Is your statement only valid for the sum till $4^x$? – user90369 Sep 03 '16 at 15:10
  • the way i first got the limits doesn't necessarily give the best ones. Even then, I don't see any problem if they get larger as you add more terms. (I am NOT talking about the zeta function though). In the case up to $6$, this does not give the best upper limit because you can't make $1,-2^x,3^x,-4^x,5^x$ all aligned against $6^x$ (almost positive reals, against an almost negative real). If $-2^x$ is a positive real then $-4^x$ is a negative real, which throws things off. – mercio Sep 03 '16 at 23:17
  • Thanks again for answering my question. It's harder than I thought. – user90369 Sep 05 '16 at 07:48