Research notes on every problem, and a library of the papers behind them. Built from the open erdos repository.
Updated
Claim. Theorem 3 (p. 6) of P. Erdős, Some problems and results on the irrationality of the sum of infinite series, J. Math. Sci. 10 (1975), 1--7, states that if and for every , then
is irrational; the paper notes that the sequence is not assumed monotone. On pp. 2--3 Erdős recalls the property he and Straus considered, that a sequence has property when is irrational for every choice of positive integers divisible by , which is the notion of an irrationality sequence in Problem 262 with ; he writes that they wondered whether has property and that he will prove this conjecture, which Theorem 3 does. So is an irrationality sequence, with . The proof reorders the into a monotone sequence, reduces by Theorem 1 to the case , and uses that at least two of are divisible by , so the least common multiple of is at most times their product; along a subsequence where is nearly as large as the growth allows, the product times the tail tends to , which rationality forbids. The paper adds that property is of interest only when , and that Erdős did not know whether a sequence with property can grow slowly, the problem's question. The source card is erdos_1976_problems_results_irrationality_sum_infinite_series, and the result page is Theorem 3.
Covers. The attained half of the answer: an irrationality sequence can grow as slowly as , so is attained. Not covered: the lower bound, that no irrationality sequence has , which is Hančl's theorem on its claim page.
Acceptance. Refereed: the Journal of Mathematical Sciences, volume 10
(1975), pp. 1--7. The site's remarks credit this paper with the example, but
the SOLVED (LEAN) label credits Hančl with the answer, so no reviewed
evidence is listed. The proof is not checked here.
Depends on. Nothing in this wiki.