# Thank you, Dr. Majumder

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Dr. Jaydeep Majumder (07 June 1972 – 22 July 2009)

Recently I finished the first part of my master’s thesis related to (complex) algebraic geometry. There are not many (useful) books available on this topic, and most of them are very costly. In fact, my college library couldn’t buy enough copies of books in this topic. However, fortunately,  Dr. Jaydeep Majumder‘s books were donated to the library and they will make my thesis possible:

Principles of Algebraic Geometry by Joseph Harris and Phillip Griffiths

Algebraic Curves and Riemann Surfaces by Rick Miranda

Hodge Theory ans Complex Algebraic Geometry – I by Claire Voisin

While reading the books, I assumed that that these books were donated after the death of some old geometer. But I was wrong. He was a young physicist, who barely spent a month at NISER. A heart breaking reason for the books essential for my thesis to exist in the college library.

Dr. Majumder was a theoretical high energy physicist who did research in String Theory. He obtained his Ph.D. under the supervision of Prof. Ashoke Sen at HRI. He joined NISER as Reader-F in June 2009, and was palnning to teach quantum mechanics during the coming semester. Unfortunately, on 22 July 2009 at the young age of 37 he suffered an untimely death due to brain tumor.

I just wanted to say that Dr. Majumder has been of great help even after his death. The knowldege and good deeds never die. I really wish he was still alive and we could discuss the amazing mathematics written in these books.

# Geometry & Arithmetic

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A couple of weeks ago I discussed a geometric solution to an arithmetic problem. In this post, I will discuss an arithmetical solution to a geometry problem. Consider the following question:

Given a square whose sides are reflecting mirrors. A ray of light leaves a point inside the square and is reflected repeatedly in the mirrors. What is the nature of its paths?

It may happen that the ray passes through a corner of the square. In that case, we assume that it returns along its former path.

In figure, the parallels to the axis are the lines, $x = m + \frac{1}{2}$ and $y = n + \frac{1}{2}$, where $m$ and $n$ are integers. The thick square, of side 1, around the origin is the square of the problem and $E\equiv(a,b)$ is the starting point. We construct all images of $E$ in the mirrors, for direct or repeated reflection. One can observe that they are of four types, the coordinates of the images of the different types being

1. $(a+2n, b+2m)$
2. $(a+2n, -b+2m+1)$
3. $(-a+2n+1, b+2m)$
4. $(-a+2n+1, -b+2m+1)$

where $m$ and $n$ are arbitrary integers. Further, if the velocity at $E$ has direction cosines, $\lambda, \mu$, then the corresponding images of the velocity have direction cosines

1. $(\lambda, \mu)$
2. $(\lambda, -\mu)$
3. $(-\lambda, \mu)$
4. $(-\lambda, -\mu)$

where we suppose (on the grounds of symmetry) that $\mu$ is positive. If we think of the plane as divided into squares of unit side, then interior of a typical square being

$\displaystyle{n -\frac{1}{2} < x < n+\frac{1}{2}, \qquad m-\frac{1}{2}

then each squares contains just one image of every point in the original sqaure, given by $n=m=0$ (shown by the bold points in the figure). And if the image in any of the above squares of any point in the original sqaure is of type (1.), (2.), (3.) or (4.), then the image in any of the above squares of any other point in the original square is of the same type.

We can now imagine $E$ moving with the ray (shown by dotted lines in the figure). When the point $E$ meets the mirror, it coincides with an image and the image of $E$ which momentarily coincides with $E$ continues the motion of $E$, in its original direction, in one of the squares adjacent to the fundamental square (the thick square). We follow the motion of the image, in this square, until it in its turn it meets a side of the square. Clearly, the original path of $E$ will be continued indefinitely in the same line $L$ (dotted line in the figure), by a series of different images.

The segment of $L$ in any square (for a given $n$ and $m$) is the image of a straight portion of the path of $E$ in the original square. There is one-to-one correspondence between the segments of $L$, in different squares, and the portions of the path of $E$ between successive reflections, each segment of $L$ being an image of the corresponding portion of the path of $E$.

The path of $E$ in the original square will be periodic if $E$ returns to its original position moving in the same direction; and this will happen if and only if $L$ passes through an image of type (1.) of the original $E$. The coordinates of an arbitrary point of $L$ are $x=a+\lambda t, \quad y = b+\mu tf$.

Hence the path will be periodic if and only if $\lambda t = 2n, \quad \mu t = 2m$, for some $t$ and integral $n,m$, i.e. if  $\frac{\lambda}{\mu}$ is rational.

When $\frac{\lambda}{\mu}$ is irrational, then the path of $E$ approaches arbitrarily near to every point $(c,d)$ of the sqaure. This follows directly from Kronecker’s Theorem in one dimension (see § 23.3 of G H. Hardy and E. M. Wright’s An Introduction to the Theory of Numbers.):

[Kronecker’s Theorem in one dimension] If $\theta$ is irrational, $\alpha$ is arbitrary, and $N$ and $\epsilon$ are positive, then there are integers $p$ and $q$ such that $p>N$ and $|p\theta - q-\alpha|<\epsilon$.

Here, we have $\theta = \frac{\lambda}{\mu}$ and $\alpha = (b-d)\frac{\lambda}{2\mu} - \frac{1}{2}(a-c)$, with large enough integers $p=m$ and $q=n$. Hence we can conclude that

[König-Szücs Theorem]Given a square whose sides are reflecting mirrors. A ray of light leaves a point inside the square and is reflected repeatedly in the mirrors. Either the path is closed and periodic or it is dense in the square, passing arbitrarily near to every point of the square. A necessary and sufficient condition for the periodicity is that the angle between a side of the square and the initial direction of the ray should have a rational tangent.

Another way of stating the above Kronecker’s theorem is

[Kronecker’s Theorem in one dimension] If $\theta$ is irrational, then the set of points $n\theta - \lfloor n\theta\rfloor$ is dense in the interval $(0,1)$.

Then with some knowledge of Fourier series, we can try to answer a more general question

Given an irrational number $\theta$, what can be said about the distribution of the fractional parts of the sequence of numbers $n\theta$, for $n=1,2,3,\ldots$?

The answer to this question is called Weyl’s Equidistribution Theorem (see §4.2 of  Elias M. Stein & Rami Shakarchi’s Fourier Analysis: An Introduction)

[Weyl’s Equidistribution Theorem] If $\theta$ is irrational, then the sequence of fractional parts $\{n\theta - \lfloor n\theta\rfloor\}_{n=1}^{\infty}$ is equidistributed in $[0,1)$.

I really enjoyed reading about this unexpected link between geometry and arithmetic (and Fourier analysis). Most of the material has been taken/copied from Hardy’s book. The solution to the geometry problem reminds me of the solution to the Cross Diagonal Cover  Problem.

# Arithmetic & Geometry

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After a month of the unexpected break from mathematics, I will resume the regular weekly blog posts. It’s a kind of relaunch of this blog, and I  will begin with the discussion of an arithmetic problem with a geometric solution.  This is problem 103 from  The USSR Olympiad Problem Book:

Prove that
$\displaystyle{t_1+t_2+\ldots + t_n = \left\lfloor\frac{n}{1}\right\rfloor + \left\lfloor\frac{n}{2}\right\rfloor + \left\lfloor\frac{n}{3}\right\rfloor + \ldots + \left\lfloor\frac{n}{n}\right\rfloor}$
where $t_k$ is the number of divisors of the natural number $k$.

One can solve this problem by using the principle of mathematical induction or using the fact that the number of integers of the sequence $1,2,3,\ldots , n$ which are divisible by any chosen integer $k$ is equal to $\left\lfloor \frac{n}{k}\right\rfloor$. The second approach of counting suggests an elegant geometric solution.

Consider the equilateral hyperbola $\displaystyle{y = \frac{k}{x}}$ , (of which we shall take only the branches in the first quadrant):

We note all the points in the first quadrant which have integer coordinates as the intersection point of the dotted lines. Now, if an integer $x$ is a divisor of the integer $k$, then the point $(x,y)$ is a point on the graph of the hyperbola $xy=k$. Conversely, if the hyperbola $xy=k$ contains an integer point, then the x-coordinate is a divisor of $k$. Hence the number of integers $t_k$ is  equal to the number of the integer points lying on the hyperbola $xy=k$. The number $t_k$ is thus equal to the number of absciassas of integer points lying on the hyperbola $xy=k$. Now, we make use of the fact that the hyperbola $xy=n$ lies “farther out” in the quadrant than do $xy=1, xy=2, xy=3, \ldots, xy=n-1$. The following implication hold:

The sum $t_1+t_2\ldots + t_n$ is equal to the number of integer points lying under or on the hyperbola $xy=n$. Each such point will lie on a hyperbola $xy=k$, where $k\leq n$. The number of integer points with abscissa $k$ located under the hyperbola is equal to the integer part of the length of the segment $\overline{AB}$ [in figure above $k=3$]. That is $\left\lfloor\frac{n}{k}\right\rfloor$, since $\displaystyle{|\overline{AB}|=\frac{n}{k}}$, i.e. ordinate of point $A$ on hyperbola $xy=n$ for abscissa $k$. Thus, we obtain

$\displaystyle{t_1+t_2+\ldots + t_n = \left\lfloor\frac{n}{1}\right\rfloor + \left\lfloor\frac{n}{2}\right\rfloor + \left\lfloor\frac{n}{3}\right\rfloor + \ldots + \left\lfloor\frac{n}{n}\right\rfloor}$

Caution: Excess of anything is harmful, even mathematics.

# Triangles and Rectangles

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Consider the following question by Bill Sands (asked in 1995):

Are there right triangles with integer sides and area, associated with rectangles having the same perimeter and area?

Try to test your intuition. The solution to this problem is NOT so simple. The solution was published by Richard K. Guy in 1995: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2974502

If you have a simpler solution, please write it in a comment below. Even I don’t understand much of the solution.

# Intra-mathematical Dependencies

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Recently I completed all of my undergraduate level maths courses, so wanted to sum up my understanding of mathematics in the following dependency diagram:

I imagine this like a wall, where each topic is a brick. You can bake different bricks at different times (i.e. follow your curriculum to learn these topics), but finally, this is how they should be arranged (in my opinion) to get the best possible understanding of mathematics.

As of now, I have an “elementary” knowledge of Set Theory, Algebra, Analysis, Topology, Geometry, Probability Theory, Combinatorics and Arithmetic. Unfortunately, in India, there are no undergraduate level courses in Mathematical Logic and Category Theory.

This post can be seen as a sequel of my “Mathematical Relations” post.

# Understanding Geometry – 3

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In some of my past posts, I have mentioned “hyperbolic curvature“,”hyperbolic trigonometry” and “hyperbolic ideal points“. In this post I will share some artworks, based on hyperbolic geometry, by contemporary artists (from Tumblr):

To explain the mathematics behind the construction of these pictures I will quote Roger Penrose from pp. 34 of  “The Road to Reality“:

Think of any circle in a Euclidean plane. The set of points lying in the interior of this circle is to represent the set of points in the entire hyperbolic plane. Straight lines, according to the hyperbolic geometry are to be represented as segments of Euclidean circles which meet the bounding circle orthogonally — which means at right angles. Now, it turns out that the hyperbolic notion of an angle between any two curves, at their point of intersection, is precisely the same as the Euclidean measure of the angle between the two curves at the intersection point. A representation of this nature is called conformal. For this reason, the particular representation of hyperbolic geometry that Escher used is sometimes referred to as the conformal model of hyperbolic plane.

In the above-quoted paragraph, Penrose refers to Escher’s “Circle Limit” works, explained in detail by Bill Casselman in this article.

# Understanding Geometry – 2

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If you want to brush up your high school geometry knowledge, then KhanAcademy is a good place to start. For example, I learned a new proof of Pythagoras Theorem (there are 4 different proofs on KhanAcademy) which uses scissors-congruence:

In this post, I will share with you few theorems from L. I. Golovina and I. M. Yaglom’s “Induction in Geometry ”  which I learned while trying to prove Midpoint-Polygon Conjecture.

Theorem 1: The sum of interior angles of an n-gon is $2\pi (n-2)$.

Theorem 2: The number of ways in which a convex n-gon can be divided into triangles by non-intersecting diagonals is given by

$\displaystyle{\frac{2(2n-5)!}{(n-1)!(n-3)!}}$

Theorem 3: Given a $\triangle ABC$, with $n-1$ straight lines $CM_1, CM_2, \ldots CM_{n-1}$ drawn through its vertex $C$, cutting the triangle into $n$ smaller triangles $\triangle ACM_1, \triangle M_1CM_2, \ldots, \triangle M_{n-1}CB$. Denote by $r_1, r_2, \ldots r_n$ and $\rho_1, \rho_2, \ldots, \rho_n$ respectively the radii of the inscribed and circumscribed circles of these triangles (all the circumscribed circles are inscribed within the angle $C$ of the triangle) and let $r$ and $\rho$ be the radii of the inscribed and circumscribed circles (respectively) of the $\triangle ABC$ itself. Then

$\displaystyle{\frac{r_1}{\rho_1} \cdot\frac{r_2}{\rho_2} \cdots\frac{r_n}{\rho_n} =\frac{r}{\rho} }$

Theorem 4: Any convex n-gon which is not a parallelogram can be enclosed by a triangle whose sides lie along three sides of the given n-gon.

Theorem 5 (Levi’s Theorem): Any convex polygon which is not a parallelogram can be covered with three homothetic polygons smaller than the given one.

The above theorem gives a good idea of what “combinatorial geometry” is all about. In this subject, the method of mathematical induction is widely used for proving various theorems. Combinatorial geometry deals with problems, connected with finite configurations of points or figures. In these problems, values are estimated connected with configurations of figures (or points) which are optimal in some sense.

Theorem 6 (Newton’s Theorem): The midpoints of the diagonals of a quadrilateral circumscribed about a circle lie on one straight line passing through the centre of the circle.

Theorem 7 (Simson’s Theorem): Given a $\triangle ABC$ inscribed in the circle $S$ with an arbitrary point $P$ on this circle. Then then feet of the perpendiculars dropped from the point $P$ to the sides of the $\triangle ABC$ are collinear.

We can extend the above idea of Simson’s line to any n-gon inscribed in a circle.

Theorem 8: A 3-dimensional space is divided into $\frac{(n+1)(n^2-n+6)}{6}$ parts by $n$ planes, each three of which intersect and no four of which have a common point.

Theorem 9: Given $n$ spheres in 3-dimesnional space, each four of which intersect. Then all these spheres intersect, i. e. there exists a point belonging to all the spheres.

Theorem 10 (Young’s Theorem): Given $n$ points in the plane such that each pair of them are at a distance of at most 1 from each other. Then all these points can be enclosed in a circle of radius $1/\sqrt{3}$.

I won’t be discussing their proofs since the booklet containing the proofs and the detailed discussion is freely available at Mir Books.

Also, I would like to make a passing remark about the existence of a different kind of geometry system, called “finite geometry“. A finite geometry is any geometric system that has only a finite number of points. The familiar Euclidean geometry is not finite because a Euclidean line contains infinitely many points. A geometry based on the graphics displayed on a computer screen, where the pixels are considered to be the points, would be a finite geometry. While there are many systems that could be called finite geometries, attention is mostly paid to the finite projective and affine spaces because of their regularity and simplicity. You can learn more about it here: http://www.ams.org/samplings/feature-column/fcarc-finitegeometries