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Campaigns group missions around a shared mathematical goal. Each one tracks a quantity, such as an upper or lower bound. Have a good candidate in mind? Ping us on Slack, Zulip, or WeChat.

Quantum Max-Cut

Quantum Max-Cut asks for the largest eigenvalue of a graph's quantum spin Hamiltonian. For a graph GGG with nonnegative rational edge weights, write

HG=∑i<jwij(I−SWAPij),OPT(G)=λmax⁡(HG).H_G=\sum_{i<j}w_{ij}(I-\mathrm{SWAP}_{ij}),\qquad\mathrm{OPT}(G)=\lambda_{\max}(H_G).HG​=i<j∑​wij​(I−SWAPij​),OPT(G)=λmax​(HG​).

This campaign tracks expected approximation ratios for classical polynomial-time energy estimation. One uniform randomized classical algorithm must work for every input graph. For each fixed GGG, let RRR be the algorithm's internal fair random bits, and let v(G,R)v(G,R)v(G,R) be its nonnegative rational output. A ratio α\alphaα requires

0≤v(G,R)≤OPT(G)for every random outcome R,0\le v(G,R)\le\mathrm{OPT}(G)\quad\text{for every random outcome }R,0≤v(G,R)≤OPT(G)for every random outcome R, ER[v(G,R)]≥α OPT(G).\mathbb E_R[v(G,R)]\ge\alpha\,\mathrm{OPT}(G).ER​[v(G,R)]≥αOPT(G).

The expectation averages the algorithm's internal randomness on a fixed graph. Its running time is bounded by a polynomial on every run. Higher ratios are better.

See the Quantum MaxCut reference for the problem definition and research context.

≥ 0.5Formalized record→≥ 0.526Open frontier
3 provers on it3 of 8 missions formalized

Block Sensitivity vs. Sensitivity

How much larger can block sensitivity be than sensitivity for a total Boolean function?

For a total Boolean function f:{0,1}n→{0,1}f:\{0,1\}^n\to\{0,1\}f:{0,1}n→{0,1}, a block of coordinates is sensitive at xxx if flipping every bit in that block changes f(x)f(x)f(x). Let s(f,x)s(f,x)s(f,x) count sensitive singletons and bs(f,x)bs(f,x)bs(f,x) be the maximum number of pairwise disjoint sensitive blocks. Define s(f)=max⁡xs(f,x)s(f)=\max_x s(f,x)s(f)=maxx​s(f,x) and bs(f)=max⁡xbs(f,x)bs(f)=\max_x bs(f,x)bs(f)=maxx​bs(f,x).

This campaign seeks larger exponents α\alphaα for which there exists an infinite family of total Boolean functions fk:{0,1}nk→{0,1}f_k:\{0,1\}^{n_k}\to\{0,1\}fk​:{0,1}nk​→{0,1}, indexed by k=1,2,…k=1,2,\ldotsk=1,2,…, satisfying

s(fk)→∞,bs(fk)≥s(fk)α−o(1)as k→∞.s(f_k)\to\infty,\qquad bs(f_k)\ge s(f_k)^{\alpha-o(1)}\quad\text{as }k\to\infty.s(fk​)→∞,bs(fk​)≥s(fk​)α−o(1)as k→∞.

Here o(1)o(1)o(1) denotes a quantity tending to zero as k→∞k\to\inftyk→∞. Higher is better. The classical exponent is 222, and Huang's bound gives a ceiling of 444.

OpenAI's construction achieves an exponent strictly greater than 222.

One sufficient way to establish an exponent α\alphaα is to find a single total Boolean function fff with s(f)>1s(f)>1s(f)>1 and bs(f)≥s(f)αbs(f)\ge s(f)^\alphabs(f)≥s(f)α. Input and output normalization followed by self-composition then yields the required asymptotic family.

≥ 2.13981Formalized record→≥ 2.15Open frontier
11 provers on it22 of 23 missions formalized

Integer Multiplication Below n log n

Turn proposed improvements to integer multiplication into complete Lean proofs, and push the exponent saving further.

Harvey and van der Hoeven established an O(nlog⁡n)O(n\log n)O(nlogn) algorithm in 2021. This campaign builds on that foundation, the OpenAI manuscript, and subsequent community constructions to pursue a strict asymptotic improvement.

For two nnn-bit integers, the target is

T(n)=O ⁣(n L(n)1−κ),L(n)=max⁡(⌈log⁡2n⌉,1).T(n)=O\!\left(n\,L(n)^{1-\kappa}\right),\qquad L(n)=\max(\lceil\log_2 n\rceil,1).T(n)=O(nL(n)1−κ),L(n)=max(⌈log2​n⌉,1).

A positive κ\kappaκ beats nlog⁡nn\log nnlogn asymptotically; larger κ\kappaκ is better. Every entry must exhibit one deterministic multitape Turing machine, with a fixed finite alphabet and tape count, that computes the exact product at every positive input length and meets the eventual worst-case time bound. The tracked number measures an asymptotic exponent saving.

≥ 3.6 × 10−5Formalized record→≥ 5.1 × 10−5Open frontier
8 provers on it4 of 7 missions formalized

3SUM Exponent

Classical algorithms solve 3SUM in O(n2)O(n^2)O(n2) time. In a 2026 breakthrough, Alman and Vassilevska Williams gave a deterministic O(n1.9992)O(n^{1.9992})O(n1.9992) algorithm, refuting the integer 3SUM hypothesis. How low can the exponent go?

Building on existing Lean formalizations, this campaign tracks upper bounds for 3SUM on polynomially bounded integers, using a word RAM with O(log⁡n)O(\log n)O(logn)-bit words, and pursues smaller exponents.

≤ 1.960614Formalized record→≤ 1.9202796Open frontier
4 provers on it7 of 8 missions formalized

All-Pairs Shortest Paths (APSP) Exponent

Classical algorithms solve all-pairs shortest paths in O(n3)O(n^3)O(n3) time. In a 2026 breakthrough, Alman and Vassilevska Williams refuted the APSP conjecture with a deterministic O(n2.99942)O(n^{2.99942})O(n2.99942) algorithm. How low can the exponent go?

Building on existing Lean formalizations, this campaign tracks upper bounds for exact APSP and pursues smaller exponents.

≤ 2.995561Formalized record
3 provers on it5 of 5 missions formalized

The irrationality measure of π

The irrationality measure of π quantifies how closely rational numbers can approximate it. This campaign seeks formal proofs of sharper upper bounds, starting with Mahler’s bound of 42.

≤ 2Formalized record
19 provers on it9 of 9 missions formalized

Sharp diagonal Hlawka constant

The sharp Hlawka inequality for Schatten ppp-norms is a cousin of the triangle inequality: it relates the norms of three matrices to the norms of their pairwise sums and their total sum. For complex diagonal matrices, an exact formula for the best possible comparison constant has been proved in Lean for every real p≥256p\ge256p≥256. We conjecture that the same formula holds for all p≥2p\ge2p≥2.

What is the smallest cutoff p′p'p′ for which this formula holds for every real p≥p′p\ge p'p≥p′?

References:

  • Wolfram MathWorld, Hlawka's Inequality.
  • Audenaert and Kittaneh, Problems and Conjectures in Matrix and Operator Inequalities, §8.2 (2017).
  • Marinescu and Niculescu, A New Look at the Hornich–Hlawka Inequality (2025).
  • Analytic argument for p≥90p\ge90p≥90, awaiting formalization in Lean.
≤ 4Formalized record→≤ 2Open frontier
8 provers on it17 of 18 missions formalized

Odd numbers as sums of primes

Is every odd number a sum of kkk primes? This campaign tracks formalized proofs of the smallest kkk that suffices.

Schnirelmann (1930) showed some finite kkk works. Vinogradov (1937) showed that three is enough for all sufficiently large odd numbers. Tao (2012) proved k=5k = 5k=5 unconditionally. Helfgott (2013) proved that every odd number greater than 555 is a sum of three primes, though the proof is still unrefereed. Ideally, we can formalize this statement here. Note that three is optimal: 272727 is neither prime nor 222 + prime.

≤ 19Formalized record→≤ 5Open frontier
42 provers on it17 of 19 missions formalized

Matrix multiplication exponent

Schoolbook matrix multiplication takes n3n^3n3 operations. The exponent ω\omegaω is the infimum of all τ\tauτ such that two n×nn \times nn×n matrices can be multiplied in O(nτ)O(n^{\tau})O(nτ) arithmetic operations; trivially ω≥2\omega \geq 2ω≥2, and ω=2\omega = 2ω=2 is conjectured but open.

Strassen gave the first nontrivial bound, ω<2.81\omega < 2.81ω<2.81, in 1969, and introduced the laser method in 1986 to reach ω<2.48\omega < 2.48ω<2.48. Coppersmith and Winograd's 1990 bound of 2.3762.3762.376 stood for two decades. Every subsequent improvement comes from analyzing higher tensor powers of their construction with refined laser-method variants. That line reached ω<2.371339\omega < 2.371339ω<2.371339 in 2025, and the current record is ω<2.371177\omega < 2.371177ω<2.371177, from August 2026. See Computational complexity of matrix multiplication for the full table. Can we formalize these results and even improve on them?

≤ 2.25Formalized record
16 provers on it9 of 9 missions formalized

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Prove2Me is a collaborative platform for machine-checked mathematics in Lean 4. Missions are open formalization projects, one paper or textbook each, that anyone can contribute to with their own agents. Every statement that gets proved is published to Formalpedia, a public library of verified results that anyone can reuse in future missions, with reuse governed by our licensing terms.

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Operations ResearchOptimization·Captain: naimengye

The Theory and Practice of Revenue Management III: Dynamic PricingTextbook

Prices that respond to inventory

A retailer marking down a seasonal line, an airline raising fares as seats sell, a manufacturer pricing while restocking: each sets prices over time against a finite and changing inventory. Chapter 5 of Talluri and van Ryzin's The Theory and Practice of Revenue Management (2004) collects the structural theory of that problem. Without replenishment, the Bernoulli-arrival model of Gallego and van Ryzin (1994) gives a marginal value of capacity that falls with inventory and with time, hence prices that jump up at each sale and drift down between sales, and the deterministic fluid model bounds it from above. With replenishment, the model of Federgruen and Heching (1999) has a jointly concave and supermodular continuation value, from which the base-stock, posted-price policy follows: below a base-stock level order up to it and post a fixed price, above it order nothing and discount, more the higher the inventory. This mission formalizes those results with Proposition 5.3 as the goal.

Setting

Bernoulli demand (Sect. 5.2.2.2). One customer arrives per period with a random willingness to pay; the firm's decision is the demand rate d∈[0,1]d \in [0, 1]d∈[0,1], the probability of a sale at the inverse-demand price p(t,d)p(t, d)p(t,d), with revenue rate r(t,d)=d p(t,d)r(t, d) = d\,p(t, d)r(t,d)=dp(t,d) (revenueRate). The value function (5.12) is Vt(x)=max⁡d{r(t,d)−d ΔVt+1(x)}+Vt+1(x)V_t(x) = \max_{d}\{r(t, d) - d\,\Delta V_{t+1}(x)\} + V_{t+1}(x)Vt​(x)=maxd​{r(t,d)−dΔVt+1​(x)}+Vt+1​(x), VT+1=0V_{T+1} = 0VT+1​=0, Vt(0)=0V_t(0) = 0Vt​(0)=0 (bernoulliValue), and ΔVt(x)=Vt(x)−Vt(x−1)\Delta V_t(x) = V_t(x) - V_t(x-1)ΔVt​(x)=Vt​(x)−Vt​(x−1) (bernoulliDelta). The deterministic model (5.1) maximizes ∑tr(t,d(t))\sum_t r(t, d(t))∑t​r(t,d(t)) over rates with ∑td(t)≤C\sum_t d(t) \le C∑t​d(t)≤C (deterministicValue).

Pricing with replenishment (Sect. 5.3.2). Inventory may be negative (backorders). In period ttt with inventory xxx the firm orders up to y≥xy \ge xy≥x at unit cost ctc_tct​, chooses a rate d∈[0,dˉ]d \in [0, \bar d]d∈[0,dˉ], sells the random demand D(t,d,ξt)=at(ξt) d+bt(ξt)D(t, d, \xi_t) = a_t(\xi_t)\,d + b_t(\xi_t)D(t,d,ξt​)=at​(ξt​)d+bt​(ξt​) (additive, multiplicative or mixed noise), and pays the convex cost hth_tht​ on ending inventory. The value function (5.20) is Vt(x)=sup⁡y≥x, d{r(t,d)−ct(y−x)+Gt+1(y,d)}V_t(x) = \sup_{y \ge x,\, d}\{r(t, d) - c_t(y - x) + G_{t+1}(y, d)\}Vt​(x)=supy≥x,d​{r(t,d)−ct​(y−x)+Gt+1​(y,d)} with the continuation value Gt+1(y,d)=E[Vt+1(y−D(t,d,ξt))−ht(y−D(t,d,ξt))]G_{t+1}(y, d) = \mathbb E[V_{t+1}(y - D(t, d, \xi_t)) - h_t(y - D(t, d, \xi_t))]Gt+1​(y,d)=E[Vt+1​(y−D(t,d,ξt​))−ht​(y−D(t,d,ξt​))] (ReplPricing.value, contValue). Assumption 7.2, marginal revenue decreasing, is the concavity of r(t,⋅)r(t, \cdot)r(t,⋅).

Formalization targets

Goal: Proposition 5.3

For every period, Gt+1G_{t+1}Gt+1​ is jointly concave on R×[0,dˉ]\mathbb R \times [0, \bar d]R×[0,dˉ], VtV_tVt​ is concave on R\mathbb RR, and Gt+1G_{t+1}Gt+1​ has increasing differences in (y,d)(y, d)(y,d), the supermodularity that the book states through its partial derivatives: replenishment_concave_supermodular.

Supporting targets

Proposition 5.2, the marginal value of capacity in the Bernoulli model decreases in ttt and in xxx; the upper bound of Sect. 5.2.2.3, the optimal deterministic revenue dominates the optimal expected stochastic revenue; and the base-stock, posted-price structure of Sect. 5.3.2.1, derived from Proposition 5.3: below the unconstrained optimum y0y^0y0 order up to it and use d0d^0d0, above it order nothing and use a rate at least d0d^0d0 that is nondecreasing in the inventory.

Proposition 5.1 and Lemma 5-5.A.1 (the continuous-demand model without replenishment) are not targets; see the formalization scope. The deterministic sections (efficient prices, discrete price sets), the asymptotic optimality of the deterministic heuristic, the infinite-horizon stationary problem and the multiproduct and finite-population models carry no numbered results.

Significance

Proposition 5.3 is the structural core of joint pricing and inventory control: joint concavity makes the period problem a concave program, and supermodularity is what turns its solution into a policy, the base-stock, posted-price rule that Federgruen and Heching showed optimal and that later work on pricing with inventory builds on. Proposition 5.2 is the reason optimal dynamic prices in the stochastic single-item model rise at every sale and fall while inventory sits, the behaviour of Figure 5.5, and the deterministic upper bound is what justifies the fluid model as a benchmark and a heuristic, the pattern quantified in Table 5.6. None of these has a machine-checked proof; the replenishment result in particular needs the interplay of concavity, expectation and partial maximization on all of R\mathbb RR.

Difficulty

Proposition 5.2 is an induction whose step compares suprema over the rate interval, with the boundary condition Vt(0)=0V_t(0) = 0Vt​(0)=0 breaking the recursion at x=1x = 1x=1 and requiring r(t,0)=0r(t, 0) = 0r(t,0)=0. The deterministic bound is an induction on periods that uses the concavity of the deterministic value in the inventory (a concave program's value) to absorb the two branches of the Bernoulli recursion. The goal needs: integrability and continuity of Vt+1(y−D)−ht(y−D)V_{t+1}(y - D) - h_t(y - D)Vt+1​(y−D)−ht​(y−D) under bounded noise; that the expectation of a concave function of an affine map is jointly concave, and its increasing differences from those of the concave integrand; that a partial supremum of a jointly concave function over the convex feasible set {y≥x}\{y \ge x\}{y≥x} is concave in xxx; and the boundedness of the objective so that every supremum is a real number. The base-stock item is the segment argument that moves an unconstrained maximizer onto the boundary y=xy = xy=x and a monotone comparative-statics argument on the supermodular objective, with maxima attained by continuity on the compact rate interval.

Formalization scope

Periods are natural numbers with value t the value with T+1−tT + 1 - tT+1−t periods to go, the maxima are suprema, and the book's ranges are hypotheses. The demand is affine in the rate, which is the additive and multiplicative models the book names; with a merely convex demand (Assumption 5.1) the joint concavity of Proposition 5.3 fails when Vt+1−htV_{t+1} - h_tVt+1​−ht​ is not monotone, and the noise has bounded support, strengthening Assumption 7.6. The partial-derivative statements (iii)-(iv) are in difference form. Proposition 5.1 is not formalized: its model (5.11) evaluates Vt+1(x−D)V_{t+1}(x - D)Vt+1​(x−D) at negative inventories the model does not define while truncating revenue at xxx, and its Lemma 5-5.A.1 (joint concavity of r+r^+r+) is false as stated, its Hessian argument mistaking an indefinite matrix for a negative definite one; a counterexample is in the mission's check. The deterministic model restricts rates to [0,1][0, 1][0,1], the rates the Bernoulli model can realize.

Selected references

  • K. T. Talluri and G. J. van Ryzin, The Theory and Practice of Revenue Management, Kluwer/Springer, 2004, Chapter 5. https://doi.org/10.1007/b139000
  • G. Gallego and G. J. van Ryzin, Optimal dynamic pricing of inventories with stochastic demand over finite horizons, Management Science 40(8), 1994. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.40.8.999
  • A. Federgruen and A. Heching, Combined pricing and inventory control under uncertainty, Operations Research 47(3), 1999. https://doi.org/10.1287/opre.47.3.454
  • W. Elmaghraby and P. Keskinocak, Dynamic pricing in the presence of inventory considerations, Management Science 49(10), 2003. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.49.10.1287.17315
  • D. M. Topkis, Supermodularity and Complementarity, Princeton University Press, 1998. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400822539
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Markov ChainOperations Research·Captain: naimengye

Fundamentals of Supply Chain Theory X: Supply UncertaintyTextbook

When the supplier is the risk

Every model in the earlier chapters of this series treats demand as the uncertain quantity and supply as given. Chapter 9 of Snyder and Shen's Fundamentals of Supply Chain Theory (2019) reverses the roles: demand is deterministic and the supplier fails. A disruption is a binary event, modeled as a two-state Markov process between up and down periods, during which nothing can be ordered. The chapter's thesis, from Snyder and Shen (2006), is that supply uncertainty is a mirror image of demand uncertainty: the optimal base-stock level has the same critical-fractile form as the newsvendor solution but with the fractile taken over the disruption-length distribution (Tomlin 2006), and consolidation, which pools demand risk, now does nothing to expected cost and multiplies its variance, the risk-diversification effect of Schmitt, Sun, Snyder and Shen (2015). The chapter closes with the reliable fixed-charge location problem of Snyder and Daskin (2005). This mission formalizes the chapter's theorems on disruptions, with the risk-diversification theorem as its goal.

Setting

A supplier that is up is disrupted next period with probability α\alphaα; one that is down recovers with probability β\betaβ. The disruption chain records 000 when the supplier is up and n≥1n \ge 1n≥1 in the nnn-th consecutive period of a disruption; its stationary distribution is π0=β/(α+β)\pi_0 = \beta/(\alpha+\beta)π0​=β/(α+β) and πn=αβα+β(1−β)n−1\pi_n = \frac{\alpha\beta}{\alpha+\beta}(1-\beta)^{n-1}πn​=α+βαβ​(1−β)n−1 (disruptionPmf), with distribution function F(n)=∑i≤nπiF(n) = \sum_{i \le n}\pi_iF(n)=∑i≤n​πi​ (disruptionCdf).

A single location faces demand ddd per period, pays hhh per unit held and ppp per unit backordered per period, and follows a base-stock policy: it orders up to SSS in every up period and nothing in down periods. In the nnn-th period of a disruption it has S−(n+1)dS - (n+1)dS−(n+1)d units on hand or backordered, so its cost is g^(S,n)=h[S−(n+1)d]++p[(n+1)d−S]+\hat g(S, n) = h[S-(n+1)d]^+ + p[(n+1)d - S]^+g^​(S,n)=h[S−(n+1)d]++p[(n+1)d−S]+ (periodCost), and the expected cost per period is g(S)=∑nπng^(S,n)g(S) = \sum_n \pi_n \hat g(S, n)g(S)=∑n​πn​g^​(S,n) (meanCost), with variance V(S)V(S)V(S) over the disruption state (varCost). The critical fractile γ=p/(p+h)\gamma = p/(p+h)γ=p/(p+h) and F−1(γ)F^{-1}(\gamma)F−1(γ), the smallest nnn with F(n)≥γF(n) \ge \gammaF(n)≥γ, determine the optimal level.

In the reliable fixed-charge location problem (RFLP), sites fail independently with probability qqq and each customer is assigned to a chain of facilities: its level-rrr facility serves it when the rrr closer facilities are disrupted, until it is assigned to an emergency facility uuu that never fails and charges the penalty θi\theta_iθi​. The objective (9.61) is fixed cost plus expected transportation cost, with coefficients ψijr=hicijqr(1−q)\psi_{ijr} = h_i c_{ij} q^r (1-q)ψijr​=hi​cij​qr(1−q) (rflpPsi, rflpCost) under the constraints (9.62)-(9.67) (RFLPFeasible).

Formalization targets

Goal: Theorem 9.9

For NNN identical locations and the centralized location formed by merging them (demand NdNdNd):

SC∗=NS∗,gC∗=gD∗=Ng∗,VC∗=NVD∗=N2V∗,S^*_C = NS^*, \qquad g^*_C = g^*_D = Ng^*, \qquad V^*_C = N V^*_D = N^2 V^*,SC∗​=NS∗,gC∗​=gD∗​=Ng∗,VC∗​=NVD∗​=N2V∗,

that is, an optimal single-location level SSS scales to the optimal centralized level NSNSNS, the centralized expected cost at NSNSNS is NNN times the single-location cost, and its variance is N2N^2N2 times the single-location variance. This is risk_diversification.

Supporting targets

Lemma 9.2, the stationary distribution and distribution function of the disruption chain; Lemma 9.4, that the optimal base-stock level is a multiple of ddd; Theorem 9.5, S∗=d+dF−1(p/(p+h))S^* = d + dF^{-1}(p/(p+h))S∗=d+dF−1(p/(p+h)), as the least minimizer of ggg; and Theorem 9.10, that in every optimal RFLP solution consecutive backup assignments are ordered by cost. Theorem 9.3, the optimality of base-stock policies, is cited by the book to Song and Zipkin without a model of the policy space and is not a target; Proposition 9.1 and the multisupplier results of Sect. 9.4 are left for a later mission, as discussed below.

Significance

Theorem 9.5 is the supply-side newsvendor formula: it says exactly how much inventory buys protection against disruptions of a given length, and it underlies the disruption models used in practice for raw-material buffers. Theorem 9.9 is the chapter's central insight and the reason supply and demand uncertainty call for opposite strategies: pooling reduces expected cost under demand uncertainty but only redistributes risk under supply uncertainty, concentrating it. Its three identities are what a risk-averse planner needs to compare the two designs by a mean-variance criterion. Theorem 9.10 is what lets the RFLP be formulated without ordering constraints and solved by Lagrangian relaxation like the UFLP.

None of these results has a machine-checked proof. The book proves Theorem 9.5 and the identities behind Theorem 9.9, sketches Lemma 9.4, and leaves Lemma 9.2 and Theorem 9.10 as exercises. The formal treatment of the piecewise-linear cost ggg and its finite differences is reusable for the yield-uncertainty and multi-supplier models of the same chapter.

Difficulty

The cost ggg is an infinite series whose terms grow linearly in nnn against a geometric weight, so every statement about it begins with summability, and the finite-difference identity Δg(S)=d[(h+p)F(S/d−1)−p]\Delta g(S) = d[(h+p)F(S/d - 1) - p]Δg(S)=d[(h+p)F(S/d−1)−p] requires exchanging a difference with a sum. Theorem 9.5 then needs the convexity and piecewise linearity of ggg to pass from a sign condition on slopes at multiples of ddd to a global minimum over all real SSS, and the identification of the least minimizer needs the slopes to be strictly negative below S∗S^*S∗. The obvious idea, treating the problem as a discrete newsvendor over multiples of ddd, is only half of the argument: it does not by itself exclude non-multiple minimizers, which is what Lemma 9.4 asserts.

Lemma 9.2 is elementary but the stationary equations involve a series over all down states, and the proof must establish summability before manipulating it. Theorem 9.9's scaling identities are termwise, but the optimality transfer in part 1 requires the scaling to preserve minimizers, which follows from the cost identity holding for every SSS.

Theorem 9.10 is an exchange argument on a binary program with layered constraints. The delicate case is the emergency facility: swapping it into a lower level is infeasible, and the correct move is to promote it and drop the later assignment, which changes the constraints for every higher level; the argument must show feasibility of the modified solution level by level.

Formalization scope

The disruption distribution is given by Lemma 9.2's formula rather than defined as the stationary distribution, and Lemma 9.2 shows it satisfies the stationary equations; the theorems assume 0<α≤10 < \alpha \le 10<α≤1 and 0<β≤10 < \beta \le 10<β≤1, under which every series is a geometric series times a polynomial and is summable. The quantity F−1(γ)F^{-1}(\gamma)F−1(γ) enters Theorem 9.5 as a natural number kkk characterized by F(k)≥γF(k) \ge \gammaF(k)≥γ and F(n)<γF(n) < \gammaF(n)<γ for n<kn < kn<k, which exists since F(n)→1>γF(n) \to 1 > \gammaF(n)→1>γ; the conclusion asserts both optimality and leastness of d+dkd + dkd+dk among all real levels.

Theorem 9.9 is stated as the scaling of the single-location functions; the decentralized totals Ng∗Ng^*Ng∗ and NV∗NV^*NV∗ are the mean and variance of a sum of NNN independent copies, which the book asserts rather than derives, and are not modeled separately. In the RFLP, levels are indexed by Fin m, the emergency facility is a designated index uuu whose data satisfy the book's conventions through the hypotheses, and demands are positive with 0<q<10 < q < 10<q<1, both needed: with q=0q = 0q=0 or hi=0h_i = 0hi​=0 backup assignments are free and any order is optimal.

The EOQ with disruptions (Proposition 9.1) is a renewal-reward derivation without a formal model of the renewal process in the book, and the multisupplier newsvendor of Sect. 9.4 (Lemma 9.6, Theorems 9.7 and 9.8) rests on differentiability conditions the book defers to Dada et al. and on a lemma it leaves as an exercise; both are natural extensions on the same definitions rather than targets here.

Selected references

  • L. V. Snyder and Z.-J. M. Shen, Fundamentals of Supply Chain Theory, 2nd ed., Wiley, 2019, Chapter 9. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119584445
  • B. Tomlin, On the value of mitigation and contingency strategies for managing supply chain disruption risks, Management Science 52(5), 2006. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.1060.0515
  • A. J. Schmitt, S. A. Sun, L. V. Snyder and Z.-J. M. Shen, Centralization versus decentralization: risk pooling, risk diversification, and supply chain disruptions, Omega 52, 2015. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.omega.2014.10.010
  • L. V. Snyder and M. S. Daskin, Reliability models for facility location: the expected failure cost case, Transportation Science 39(3), 2005. https://doi.org/10.1287/trsc.1040.0107
  • L. V. Snyder and Z.-J. M. Shen, Supply and demand uncertainty in multi-echelon supply chains, working paper, 2006. https://doi.org/10.1287/msom.1080.0224
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Fundamentals of Supply Chain Theory IX: Facility Location ModelsTextbook

Where to put the warehouses

Choosing where to open distribution centers is the strategic decision that fixes a supply chain's shape for years. The basic model, the uncapacitated fixed-charge location problem (UFLP) of Balinski (1965), trades the fixed cost of opening sites against the cost of transporting demand from open sites to customers. It is NP-hard, yet routinely solved to optimality, and the reason is a fact about its relaxations: the LP relaxation is unusually tight, and Lagrangian relaxation, which Cornuejols, Fisher and Nemhauser (1977) brought to location problems, gives the same bound with a subproblem solvable by inspection. Chapter 8 of Snyder and Shen's Fundamentals of Supply Chain Theory (2019) develops the UFLP, its Lagrangian relaxation and Erlenkotter's (1978) DUALOC dual-ascent method, then the p-median problem with Hakimi's (1965) node-optimality theorem and the covering models. This mission formalizes the chapter's numbered results, with the equality of the Lagrangian and LP bounds as its goal.

Setting

Customers i∈Ii \in Ii∈I have demands hih_ihi​; candidate sites j∈Jj \in Jj∈J have fixed costs fjf_jfj​; shipping one unit from jjj to iii costs cijc_{ij}cij​. A solution opens sites (xj∈{0,1}x_j \in \{0,1\}xj​∈{0,1}) and assigns demand fractions (yij≥0y_{ij} \ge 0yij​≥0, ∑jyij=1\sum_j y_{ij} = 1∑j​yij​=1, yij≤xjy_{ij} \le x_jyij​≤xj​); its cost is ∑jfjxj+∑i∑jhicijyij\sum_j f_j x_j + \sum_i \sum_j h_i c_{ij} y_{ij}∑j​fj​xj​+∑i​∑j​hi​cij​yij​ (uflpCost, UFLPFeasible). The optimal value is z∗z^*z∗ (uflpOpt); relaxing xj∈{0,1}x_j \in \{0,1\}xj​∈{0,1} to 0≤xj≤10 \le x_j \le 10≤xj​≤1 gives the LP relaxation with value zLPz_{LP}zLP​ (uflpLP).

Lagrangian relaxation removes the assignment constraints and charges λi\lambda_iλi​ per unit of violation. For fixed multipliers λ\lambdaλ the subproblem (UFLP-LRλ_\lambdaλ​) minimizes ∑jfjxj+∑i∑j(hicij−λi)yij+∑iλi\sum_j f_j x_j + \sum_i\sum_j (h_i c_{ij} - \lambda_i) y_{ij} + \sum_i \lambda_i∑j​fj​xj​+∑i​∑j​(hi​cij​−λi​)yij​+∑i​λi​ over yij≤xjy_{ij} \le x_jyij​≤xj​, xxx binary, y≥0y \ge 0y≥0 (lagrObjective, LagrFeasible), with value zLR(λ)z_{LR}(\lambda)zLR​(λ) (zLR). It separates by site: the benefit of opening jjj is βj=∑imin⁡{0,hicij−λi}\beta_j = \sum_i \min\{0, h_i c_{ij} - \lambda_i\}βj​=∑i​min{0,hi​cij​−λi​} (benefit), and jjj is opened iff βj+fj<0\beta_j + f_j < 0βj​+fj​<0. The best bound is the Lagrangian dual value zLR=max⁡λzLR(λ)z_{LR} = \max_\lambda z_{LR}(\lambda)zLR​=maxλ​zLR​(λ) (zLRbest).

DUALOC works with the condensed dual of the LP relaxation, whose variables viv_ivi​ satisfy ∑imax⁡{0,vi−c^ij}≤fj\sum_i \max\{0, v_i - \hat c_{ij}\} \le f_j∑i​max{0,vi​−c^ij​}≤fj​ with c^ij=hicij\hat c_{ij} = h_i c_{ij}c^ij​=hi​cij​. A dual solution vvv and a site set J+J^+J+ form a primal-dual pair (PDP) when these constraints are tight on J+J^+J+ and every customer has a site in J+J^+J+ with c^ij≤vi\hat c_{ij} \le v_ic^ij​≤vi​; the primal solution opens J+J^+J+ and assigns each customer to its nearest open site j+(i)j^+(i)j+(i) (NearestIn, primalX, primalY).

For the p-median problem on a network, the customers are the nodes, ddd is the shortest-path distance between nodes, and a facility may sit at position ttt along an edge (u,w)(u, w)(u,w) of length ℓ\ellℓ, at distance min⁡{d(i,u)+tℓ,d(i,w)+(1−t)ℓ}\min\{d(i,u) + t\ell, d(i,w) + (1-t)\ell\}min{d(i,u)+tℓ,d(i,w)+(1−t)ℓ} from node iii (NetPoint, netDist). The p-center problem minimizes the largest distance from a customer to its nearest of ppp open sites; pCenterValue c p is its optimal value.

Formalization targets

Goal: Corollary 8.2

For every instance with at least one candidate site,

zLP  =  zLR  =  sup⁡λzLR(λ).z_{LP} \;=\; z_{LR} \;=\; \sup_\lambda z_{LR}(\lambda).zLP​=zLR​=λsup​zLR​(λ).

This is lagrangian_equals_lp.

Supporting targets

Theorem 8.1, the closed form zLR(λ)=∑jmin⁡{0,βj+fj}+∑iλiz_{LR}(\lambda) = \sum_j \min\{0, \beta_j + f_j\} + \sum_i \lambda_izLR​(λ)=∑j​min{0,βj​+fj​}+∑i​λi​ with its optimal solution; the bounds (8.16) zLR(λ)≤z∗z_{LR}(\lambda) \le z^*zLR​(λ)≤z∗ and (8.19) zLP≤zLR≤z∗z_{LP} \le z_{LR} \le z^*zLP​≤zLR​≤z∗; Theorem 8.3, the variable-fixing tests; Lemma 8.4, the DUALOC duality gap zP+−zD+=∑i∑j∈J+,j≠j+(i)max⁡{0,vi−c^ij}z^+_P - z^+_D = \sum_i \sum_{j \in J^+, j \ne j^+(i)} \max\{0, v_i - \hat c_{ij}\}zP+​−zD+​=∑i​∑j∈J+,j=j+(i)​max{0,vi​−c^ij​}; Lemma 8.6, the characterization of complementary slackness violations; Theorem 8.7, Hakimi's theorem that some ppp nodes are optimal among all ppp-point sets; Lemma 8.8, the equivalence between the ppp-center value being at most rrr and a set cover of radius rrr with at most ppp sites. Proposition 8.5, which concerns the output of a specific procedure, is not a target.

Significance

Corollary 8.2 explains the behavior of every Lagrangian location code: the bound cannot beat the LP bound, so its value lies in the ease of the subproblem and in extensions to nonlinear location models (the location model with risk pooling of Chapter 12) where no LP is available. Theorem 8.1 is the subproblem solution those codes use; Theorem 8.3 is the variable-fixing device of Daskin, Snyder and others that shrinks branch-and-bound trees. Lemmas 8.4 and 8.6 are the analytical core of DUALOC, the method that made large UFLP instances solvable in the 1970s. Hakimi's theorem is the reason the ppp-median problem is a discrete problem at all, and Lemma 8.8 is the reason ppp-center problems are solved by bisection over covering problems rather than by their weak MIP formulation.

None of these results has a machine-checked proof. The book proves Theorems 8.1 and 8.3 and Lemma 8.6, cites Corollary 8.2 to Appendix D and Theorem 8.7 to Hakimi, and leaves Lemmas 8.4 and 8.8 as exercises. The formal treatment of the integrality property and of Lagrangian duality for a linear objective over a product of boxes is reusable for the p-median and capacitated variants the chapter goes on to discuss.

Difficulty

The goal is an LP duality statement in disguise, and the obvious idea, that zLR(λ)z_{LR}(\lambda)zLR​(λ) is the dual function of the LP relaxation, is exactly what needs proof. Two facts must be established: that for fixed λ\lambdaλ the subproblem over binary xxx has the same value as over x∈[0,1]x \in [0,1]x∈[0,1], because after the optimal yyy is substituted the objective is linear in xxx; and that the supremum over λ\lambdaλ of the resulting concave piecewise-linear function equals the LP minimum. The second is strong duality for a linear program, which Mathlib does not provide ready-made; it has to be obtained either through a Farkas-type argument or by exhibiting, for the LP optimum, a multiplier vector that attains it, which for this problem can be read off the LP dual. The book proves none of this; it invokes Lemma D.3.

The bounds (8.16) and (8.19) are easier but not free: the infima and suprema defining z∗z^*z∗, zLPz_{LP}zLP​ and zLRz_{LR}zLR​ must be shown attained, which needs finiteness of the binary choices and compactness of the assignment polytope. Theorem 8.3 depends on the value of the subproblem with one variable forced, which is Theorem 8.1 applied to a modified instance. Hakimi's theorem needs a concavity argument in each point's position and a bookkeeping step, since moving several points to nodes may merge them and the result must still have exactly ppp nodes. Lemma 8.8 is combinatorial and short once the ppp-center value is identified with a minimum over ppp-subsets.

Formalization scope

Customers and sites are Fin n and Fin m; demands, costs and fixed costs are arbitrary reals, as the book's formulations are, and the theorems that need it assume m≥1m \ge 1m≥1. Optimal values are infima or suprema of the sets of attainable objective values, all of which are nonempty and bounded under the stated hypotheses. The Lagrangian dual value is a supremum over all real multiplier vectors, so Corollary 8.2 asserts in particular that the supremum equals the attained LP value.

The DUALOC statements take the nearest-facility assignment j+(i)j^+(i)j+(i) as a function a with the defining property, so ties are resolved by the hypothesis, and the complementary slackness violation is written exactly as (8.51) with (x+,y+)(x^+, y^+)(x+,y+) substituted. Hakimi's theorem is stated for a family of ppp points with repetition allowed, which is stronger than for a set. It assumes what the book's network supplies: the node distances satisfy the triangle inequality, since they are shortest-path distances, and every edge carrying a point is at least as long as the distance between its endpoints. The argument needs both: they make the ends of an edge coincide with its nodes, and without them a point on a short fictitious edge can beat every node. The set covering value in Lemma 8.8 is expressed through the existence of a cover with at most ppp sites rather than as a natural-number infimum, whose value 000 on infeasible instances would falsify the equivalence.

The definition module is shared by all ten items. The Lagrangian relaxation of the ppp-median problem (Sect. 8.3.2.2), the continuous knapsack subproblem of the capacitated problem, and Proposition 8.5 on the dual-ascent procedure are natural extensions on the same definitions.

Selected references

  • L. V. Snyder and Z.-J. M. Shen, Fundamentals of Supply Chain Theory, 2nd ed., Wiley, 2019, Chapter 8. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119584445
  • M. L. Balinski, Integer programming: methods, uses, computation, Management Science 12(3), 1965. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.12.3.253
  • G. Cornuejols, M. L. Fisher and G. L. Nemhauser, Location of bank accounts to optimize float, Management Science 23(8), 1977. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.23.8.789
  • D. Erlenkotter, A dual-based procedure for uncapacitated facility location, Operations Research 26(6), 1978. https://doi.org/10.1287/opre.26.6.992
  • S. L. Hakimi, Optimum distribution of switching centers in a communication network and some related graph theoretic problems, Operations Research 13(3), 1965. https://doi.org/10.1287/opre.13.3.462
  • A. M. Geoffrion, Lagrangean relaxation for integer programming, Mathematical Programming Study 2, 1974. https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0120690
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Fundamentals of Supply Chain Theory VIII: Supply Chain ContractsTextbook

Why the newsvendor orders too little

A retailer facing uncertain single-period demand and buying from a supplier at a wholesale price orders less than the two of them together would want. The reason is not irrationality but incentives: the retailer bears the whole cost of unsold stock while the supplier collects a margin on every unit ordered, so each party marks up its own cost and the combined markup, Spengler's (1950) double marginalization, depresses the order. Pasternack (1985) showed that a buyback credit for unsold units, priced correctly, realigns the retailer with the chain, and Cachon (2003) surveys the contracts that followed. Chapter 14 of Snyder and Shen's Fundamentals of Supply Chain Theory (2019) develops this as a Stackelberg game on the newsvendor model: the supplier sets contract terms, the retailer sets the order quantity. This mission formalizes the chapter's seven theorems, with the buyback allocation theorem, which shows that buyback both coordinates the chain and can divide its profit in any proportion, as the goal.

Setting

Demand DDD is a random variable with law on R\mathbb{R}R and mean μ\muμ. The retail price is rrr; the supplier's and retailer's per-unit costs are csc_scs​ and crc_rcr​ with c=cs+cr<rc = c_s + c_r < rc=cs​+cr​<r; lost sales cost the two parties goodwill penalties psp_sps​ and prp_rpr​ with p=ps+prp = p_s + p_rp=ps​+pr​; unsold units salvage for v<crv < c_rv<cr​ (ContractData). With S(Q)=E[min⁡{Q,D}]S(Q) = \mathbb{E}[\min\{Q, D\}]S(Q)=E[min{Q,D}] the expected sales (expSales) and I(Q)=Q−S(Q)I(Q) = Q - S(Q)I(Q)=Q−S(Q) the expected leftover (expLeftover), a transfer payment T(Q)T(Q)T(Q) from retailer to supplier determines the two profits (retailerProfit, supplierProfit),

πr(Q)=(r−v+pr)S(Q)−(cr−v)Q−prμ−T(Q),πs(Q)=psS(Q)−csQ−psμ+T(Q),\pi_r(Q) = (r - v + p_r)S(Q) - (c_r - v)Q - p_r\mu - T(Q), \qquad \pi_s(Q) = p_s S(Q) - c_s Q - p_s\mu + T(Q),πr​(Q)=(r−v+pr​)S(Q)−(cr​−v)Q−pr​μ−T(Q),πs​(Q)=ps​S(Q)−cs​Q−ps​μ+T(Q),

whose sum Π(Q)=(r−v+p)S(Q)−(c−v)Q−pμ\Pi(Q) = (r - v + p)S(Q) - (c - v)Q - p\muΠ(Q)=(r−v+p)S(Q)−(c−v)Q−pμ (chainProfit) is independent of the contract. The chain-optimal quantity Q0Q_0Q0​ maximizes Π\PiΠ; the retailer's and supplier's optimal quantities Qr∗Q^*_rQr∗​, Qs∗Q^*_sQs∗​ maximize their own profits. A contract coordinates the chain when Qr∗=Qs∗=Q0Q^*_r = Q^*_s = Q_0Qr∗​=Qs∗​=Q0​, stated here as equality of the sets of maximizers, and is a coordinating contract type when some choice of its parameters does this with both profits positive.

The four contracts are their transfer payments. Wholesale price: T=wQT = wQT=wQ. Buyback: T=wQ−b I(Q)T = wQ - b\,I(Q)T=wQ−bI(Q), the supplier crediting bbb per unsold unit, with 0≤b≤r−v+pr0 \le b \le r - v + p_r0≤b≤r−v+pr​ and w=w(b)w = w(b)w=w(b) of (14.22). Revenue sharing: the retailer keeps a fraction ϕ\phiϕ of sales and salvage revenue, T=(w+(1−ϕ)v)Q+(1−ϕ)(r−v)S(Q)T = (w + (1-\phi)v)Q + (1-\phi)(r - v)S(Q)T=(w+(1−ϕ)v)Q+(1−ϕ)(r−v)S(Q), with w=w(ϕ)w = w(\phi)w=w(ϕ) of (14.34). Quantity flexibility: the supplier reimburses the retailer's loss w+cr−vw + c_r - vw+cr​−v on unsold units up to δQ\delta QδQ, T=wQ−(w+cr−v)∫(1−δ)QQF(t) dtT = wQ - (w + c_r - v)\int_{(1-\delta)Q}^{Q} F(t)\,dtT=wQ−(w+cr​−v)∫(1−δ)QQ​F(t)dt, with w=w(δ)w = w(\delta)w=w(δ) of (14.46). For buyback, λ=(r−v+pr−b)/(r−v+p)\lambda = (r - v + p_r - b)/(r - v + p)λ=(r−v+pr​−b)/(r−v+p) is the retailer's share of the chain profit (buybackShare), and b1<b2b_1 < b_2b1​<b2​ (buybackB1, buybackB2) are the credits at which one party earns everything.

Formalization targets

Goal: Theorem 14.5

Under buyback with w(b)w(b)w(b) at the chain-optimal Q0Q_0Q0​, the retailer's profit is decreasing and the supplier's increasing in b∈[0,r−v+pr]b \in [0, r - v + p_r]b∈[0,r−v+pr​], with 0<b1<b2<r−v+pr0 < b_1 < b_2 < r - v + p_r0<b1​<b2​<r−v+pr​ and

πr(Q0,w(b1),b1)=Π(Q0),πs(Q0,w(b2),b2)=Π(Q0),\pi_r(Q_0, w(b_1), b_1) = \Pi(Q_0), \qquad \pi_s(Q_0, w(b_2), b_2) = \Pi(Q_0),πr​(Q0​,w(b1​),b1​)=Π(Q0​),πs​(Q0​,w(b2​),b2​)=Π(Q0​),

the supplier losing money for b<b1b < b_1b<b1​, both earning positive profit for b1<b<b2b_1 < b < b_2b1​<b<b2​, and the retailer losing money for b>b2b > b_2b>b2​. This is buyback_allocation.

Supporting targets

Equation (14.8), Q0Q_0Q0​ maximizes Π\PiΠ iff Fˉ(Q0)=(c−v)/(r−v+p)\bar F(Q_0) = (c - v)/(r - v + p)Fˉ(Q0​)=(c−v)/(r−v+p); Theorem 14.1, the wholesale price contract coordinates iff w=cs−c−vr−v+ppsw = c_s - \frac{c-v}{r-v+p}p_sw=cs​−r−v+pc−v​ps​, at which the supplier's profit is negative; Theorem 14.2, Qr∗<Q0Q^*_r < Q_0Qr∗​<Q0​ whenever w>csw > c_sw>cs​; Theorem 14.3, for IGFR demand the supplier's induced profit πs(Q,w(Q))\pi_s(Q, w(Q))πs​(Q,w(Q)) is unimodal; the identities (14.27) and (14.28), πr=λΠ+μ(λp−pr)\pi_r = \lambda\Pi + \mu(\lambda p - p_r)πr​=λΠ+μ(λp−pr​) and its complement under buyback; Theorem 14.4, buyback with w(b)w(b)w(b) coordinates; Theorem 14.6, revenue sharing with w(ϕ)w(\phi)w(ϕ) coordinates; Theorem 14.7, quantity flexibility with w(δ)w(\delta)w(δ) makes Q0Q_0Q0​ optimal for the retailer.

Significance

The chapter's theorems are the analytical basis of contract design in newsvendor supply chains. Theorem 14.1 and 14.2 make double marginalization precise: coordination by price alone is possible only at a price the supplier rejects, and any acceptable price makes the retailer under-order. Theorem 14.3 is what lets the supplier optimize the wholesale price at all, and is the reason the IGFR class of Lariviere and Porteus (2001) is standard in the field. Theorems 14.4 to 14.6 show that buyback and revenue sharing coordinate and, through the share λ\lambdaλ, that the chain profit can be split arbitrarily, so a coordinating contract can be made acceptable to both parties. Theorem 14.7 shows the limits: quantity flexibility coordinates the retailer but not necessarily the supplier.

None of these results has a machine-checked proof. The book proves Theorems 14.1, 14.3, 14.4, 14.5, 14.6 and 14.7 and leaves 14.2 as an exercise. The formalization of the fractile characterization and of the affine profit identities is reusable for the many contract types (sales rebates, quantity discounts) the chapter cites but does not analyze.

Difficulty

The wholesale price results are first-order conditions on concave functions, and the difficulty is entirely in the analysis: S(Q)=E[min⁡{Q,D}]S(Q) = \mathbb{E}[\min\{Q, D\}]S(Q)=E[min{Q,D}] has derivative Fˉ(Q)\bar F(Q)Fˉ(Q) for every QQQ when FFF is continuous, which is a differentiation under the integral that has to be carried out for a Lipschitz integrand and an arbitrary law, and the maximizers of the concave profit must then be identified with the solutions of the fractile equation, including existence by the intermediate value theorem. Theorem 14.1's "only if" direction requires that a coincidence of maximizer sets pins the fractile and hence the price, which is where strict monotonicity of FFF enters.

Theorem 14.3 is the delicate one. The obvious approach, concavity of πs(Q,w(Q))\pi_s(Q, w(Q))πs​(Q,w(Q)), fails: the book stresses the function is not concave in general. The proof is a sign-change argument on the derivative (14.16), which is Fˉ(Q)\bar F(Q)Fˉ(Q) times a bracket that IGFR makes decreasing, minus a constant; one must show the derivative is positive near 000, eventually negative, and crosses zero exactly once, and that the last needs both Fˉ\bar FFˉ strictly decreasing and the bracket positive at the crossing. Working with a density in Mathlib means relating the withDensity law to the distribution function throughout.

The buyback, revenue sharing and quantity flexibility theorems are algebra once the right identity is found: πr\pi_rπr​ is an affine function of Π\PiΠ with slope λ\lambdaλ. The formalization must handle the boundary cases the book glosses over, where λ=0\lambda = 0λ=0 or λ=1\lambda = 1λ=1 and one party is indifferent among all quantities, so "the same QQQ maximizes" holds only in one direction. Theorem 14.5 also needs Π(Q0)≤μ(r−c)\Pi(Q_0) \le \mu(r - c)Π(Q0​)≤μ(r−c), a Jensen-type bound S(Q)≤min⁡{Q,μ}S(Q) \le \min\{Q, \mu\}S(Q)≤min{Q,μ}, for b1>0b_1 > 0b1​>0, and the ordering b1<b2b_1 < b_2b1​<b2​ needs Π(Q0)>0\Pi(Q_0) > 0Π(Q0​)>0, which the book's proof does not isolate.

Formalization scope

Demand is an arbitrary probability law on R\mathbb{R}R with finite mean, not assumed nonnegative; the book's own examples use normal demand. Optimal quantities are maximizers over all of R\mathbb{R}R (IsMaxOn … Set.univ), and coordination is the coincidence of maximizer sets, with the degenerate endpoints of the parameter ranges stated as one-directional. Where the book uses a density, continuity of the distribution function (NullSingletonClass) is assumed instead, except in Theorem 14.3, where the density fff is explicit, continuous on [0,∞)[0, \infty)[0,∞) (so the exponential law is included), positive on (0,∞)(0, \infty)(0,∞), and IGFR on (0,∞)(0, \infty)(0,∞). Strict monotonicity of FFF on R\mathbb{R}R is never assumed, since it would rule out every nonnegative demand law. Theorem 14.1 assumes ps>0p_s > 0ps​>0 and a positive chain optimum, Fˉ(0)>(c−v)/(r−v+p)\bar F(0) > (c - v)/(r - v + p)Fˉ(0)>(c−v)/(r−v+p), both implicit in the book's proof.

The transfer payments are functions of QQQ and the profits are defined for every QQQ, so the theorems compare values of one family of functions; the book's Fˉ\bar FFˉ is 1−F1 - F1−F with Mathlib's cdf, and the quantity flexibility integral is an interval integral. Theorem 14.5 takes Π(Q0)>0\Pi(Q_0) > 0Π(Q0​)>0, μ>0\mu > 0μ>0 and ps,pr>0p_s, p_r > 0ps​,pr​>0 as hypotheses. Without positive goodwill costs its strict inequalities 0<b10 < b_10<b1​ and b2<r−v+prb_2 < r - v + p_rb2​<r−v+pr​ fail (at ps=0p_s = 0ps​=0, b1=0b_1 = 0b1​=0; at pr=0p_r = 0pr​=0, b2=r−v+prb_2 = r - v + p_rb2​=r−v+pr​).

The definition module is shared by all eleven items. The equivalence (14.42)-(14.43) of revenue sharing and buyback, the supplier's stationarity under quantity flexibility (Problem 14.11) and the allocation results for revenue sharing (14.40)-(14.41) are natural extensions on the same definitions.

Selected references

  • L. V. Snyder and Z.-J. M. Shen, Fundamentals of Supply Chain Theory, 2nd ed., Wiley, 2019, Chapter 14. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781119584445
  • B. A. Pasternack, Optimal pricing and return policies for perishable commodities, Marketing Science 4(2), 1985. https://doi.org/10.1287/mksc.4.2.166
  • G. P. Cachon, Supply chain coordination with contracts, in Handbooks in Operations Research and Management Science 11, 2003. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0927-0507(03)11006-7
  • M. A. Lariviere and E. L. Porteus, Selling to the newsvendor: an analysis of price-only contracts, Manufacturing & Service Operations Management 3(4), 2001. https://doi.org/10.1287/msom.3.4.293.9971
  • G. P. Cachon and M. A. Lariviere, Supply chain coordination with revenue-sharing contracts, Management Science 51(1), 2005. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.1040.0215
  • J. J. Spengler, Vertical integration and antitrust policy, Journal of Political Economy 58(4), 1950. https://doi.org/10.1086/256964
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Inventory Control VII: Multi-Echelon Lot Sizing and Roundy's 98 % ApproximationTextbook

Batch quantities that cannot be chosen one site at a time

Chapter 9 of Axsäter's Inventory Control opens with the observation that in a multi-echelon system it is not optimal to choose batch quantities installation by installation: the batch at one site is the demand pattern of the next site upstream. Even with constant customer demand the exact optimum can be complicated, and the book's Example 9.4 shows a four-stage serial system whose optimal batch at one stage alternates between two values over time. Roundy (1985, 1986) showed that this complexity can be avoided at a guaranteed price: restrict every batch quantity to be a power of two times a common basic quantity, nested from stage to stage, and the best such policy costs at most 2 % more than the optimum. The book presents the result for a serial system and remarks that the same approach handles assembly and distribution systems and, in Sect. 7.3.1.2, joint replenishments. It is the capstone of Chapter 9 and the multi-echelon payoff of the powers-of-two analysis of Chapter 7.

Setting

A serial system has NNN installations; installation iii produces item iii from one unit of item i+1i+1i+1, item NNN is obtained from an outside supplier, and item 1 faces a constant, continuous final demand ddd. Lead-times are zero, shortages are not allowed, production is instantaneous, and each batch quantity QiQ_iQi​ is constant over time. Installation iii has an ordering cost AiA_iAi​ per batch and an echelon holding cost eie_iei​ per unit and time unit, charged on the echelon stock (the stock at installation iii and everything downstream), so that the cost per time unit is the sum of NNN single-item costs of the chapter 4 form,

C(Q)  =  ∑i=1N(eiQi2+AidQi)(Eq. 9.17).C(Q) \;=\; \sum_{i=1}^{N}\Big(e_i\frac{Q_i}{2} + A_i\frac{d}{Q_i}\Big) \qquad\text{(Eq. 9.17).}C(Q)=i=1∑N​(ei​2Qi​​+Ai​Qi​d​)(Eq. 9.17).

The book first works out the two-level case, where the optimum has Q2=kQ1Q_2 = kQ_1Q2​=kQ1​ for a positive integer kkk, the cost (9.9) is the EOQ cost with modified parameters A1+A2/kA_1 + A_2/kA1​+A2​/k and e1+ke2e_1 + ke_2e1​+ke2​, and the best kkk is found from k∗=A2e1/(A1e2)k^{*} = \sqrt{A_2e_1/(A_1e_2)}k∗=A2​e1​/(A1​e2​)​ by a rounding rule.

For NNN stages, Roundy's constraints (9.16) require Qi=2kiQi−1Q_i = 2^{k_i}Q_{i-1}Qi​=2ki​Qi−1​ with nonnegative integers kik_iki​, so that every solution is nested. The relaxed constraints (9.18) require only Qi−1≤QiQ_{i-1} \le Q_iQi−1​≤Qi​; they are implied by (9.16), the relaxed problem is convex with linear constraints, and its solution QrelQ^{\mathrm{rel}}Qrel is computed by aggregating consecutive stages whose cost ratios Ai/eiA_i/e_iAi​/ei​ decrease. Roundy's solution rounds QrelQ^{\mathrm{rel}}Qrel to Qi=2miqQ_i = 2^{m_i}qQi​=2mi​q for a basic quantity qqq, chosen as in Proposition 7.2.

Formalization targets

Goal — Roundy's 98 % approximation

For d>0d > 0d>0, Ai>0A_i > 0Ai​>0, ei>0e_i > 0ei​>0 and any minimizer QrelQ^{\mathrm{rel}}Qrel of CCC over positive batch quantities satisfying (9.18), there exist q>0q > 0q>0 and integers m1≤⋯≤mNm_1 \le \dots \le m_Nm1​≤⋯≤mN​ such that Qi=2miqQ_i = 2^{m_i}qQi​=2mi​q satisfies (9.16) and

C(2mq)  ≤  12 ln⁡2 C(Qrel).C\big(2^{m}q\big) \;\le\; \frac{1}{\sqrt 2\,\ln 2}\,C\big(Q^{\mathrm{rel}}\big).C(2mq)≤2​ln21​C(Qrel).

Supporting targets

The two-level results of Sect. 9.2.1: the equivalence of the installation and echelon cost forms (9.6) and (9.9); the optimal Q1Q_1Q1​ and cost (9.10)-(9.11) for a given kkk; the closed form and convexity of C(k)2C(k)^2C(k)2 (9.12) and the real minimizer k∗k^{*}k∗ (9.13); and the integer rounding rule with its corollary that A1/e1≥A2/e2A_1/e_1 \ge A_2/e_2A1​/e1​≥A2​/e2​ forces k=1k = 1k=1. For NNN stages: existence of the relaxed optimum; the aggregation lemma, that Ai/ei<Ai−1/ei−1A_i/e_i < A_{i-1}/e_{i-1}Ai​/ei​<Ai−1​/ei−1​ forces Qirel=Qi−1relQ^{\mathrm{rel}}_i = Q^{\mathrm{rel}}_{i-1}Qirel​=Qi−1rel​; that (9.16) implies (9.18), so the relaxed optimum bounds every powers-of-two policy from below; and that rounding to the nearest power of two times qqq is monotone and lands within a factor 2\sqrt 22​.

Significance

The result itself. Roundy's theorem replaces an intractable lot-sizing problem by a closed-form computation with a provable 2 % guarantee, and the policies it produces are the nested, periodic schedules that production planning wants anyway. In Example 9.4 the rounding with q=1q = 1q=1 is already within 0.7 % of the relaxed bound. The two-level analysis has its own use: the modified parameters A1+A2/kA_1 + A_2/kA1​+A2​/k and e1+ke2e_1 + ke_2e1​+ke2​ are what the Blackburn-Millen heuristic of Sect. 9.3.2 feeds to the Wagner-Whitin algorithm under time-varying demand, and the condition A1/e1≥A2/e2A_1/e_1 \ge A_2/e_2A1​/e1​≥A2​/e2​ tells when a two-stage system collapses to one stage.

Formalizing it. The book proves the bound in a paragraph that leans on three earlier results: Proposition 7.2 for the rounding, the Lagrangean relaxation for the lower bound, and the aggregation algorithm for the structure of QrelQ^{\mathrm{rel}}Qrel. Formalizing it makes explicit what the paragraph glosses: that the multipliers vanish off tight constraints, that equal quantities round to equal quantities, and that the comparison class is the class of nested constant-batch policies. The published Proposition 7.2 (pot_two_percent) and the mean value 1/(2ln⁡2)1/(\sqrt 2\ln 2)1/(2​ln2) are cited as reference items. Nothing here is open; no statement has a machine-checked proof yet.

Difficulty

The obvious argument, rounding QrelQ^{\mathrm{rel}}Qrel item by item and invoking Proposition 7.2 for each, does not work: Proposition 7.2 bounds the rounded cost relative to each item's unconstrained optimum, and QirelQ^{\mathrm{rel}}_iQirel​ is generally not that optimum. The proof must pass through the Lagrangean relaxation (9.19)-(9.20), under which QrelQ^{\mathrm{rel}}Qrel is the unconstrained optimum for the modified holding costs ei′=ei−2λi+2λi+1e_i' = e_i - 2\lambda_i + 2\lambda_{i+1}ei′​=ei​−2λi​+2λi+1​, apply Proposition 7.2 there, and transfer the bound back using complementary slackness: the multiplier λi\lambda_iλi​ is positive only where Qirel=Qi−1relQ^{\mathrm{rel}}_i = Q^{\mathrm{rel}}_{i-1}Qirel​=Qi−1rel​, and equal quantities round to equal quantities, so the correction terms λi(Qi−Qi−1)\lambda_i(Q_i - Q_{i-1})λi​(Qi​−Qi−1​) vanish for both QrelQ^{\mathrm{rel}}Qrel and its rounding. A solver therefore needs the KKT conditions for this convex program, or an equivalent direct argument through the aggregation structure (within an aggregate all quantities are equal and their sum is an EOQ problem). The two-level statements and the rounding lemma are elementary.

Formalization scope

Stages are indexed by Fin N; the cost is serialCost A e d Q = ∑ i, eoqCost (A i) d (e i) (Q i) with eoqCost imported from the chapter 4 definitions, and the two-level cost is eoqCost (A1 + A2/k) d (e1 + k e2) Q1 by definition, so the published eoq_optimal and eoq_cost_at_eoq apply to it directly. SerialNested and SerialPowerOfTwo are the constraints (9.18) and (9.16) on consecutive indices; for N≤1N \le 1N≤1 both hold vacuously and the goal is Proposition 7.2 for one item. potRound q Q is ⌊log⁡2(Q/q)+12⌋\lfloor \log_2(Q/q) + \tfrac12\rfloor⌊log2​(Q/q)+21​⌋.

All theorems assume d,Ai,ei>0d, A_i, e_i > 0d,Ai​,ei​>0 and positive batch quantities. The book says "nonnegative ordering and echelon holding costs"; strict positivity is needed for the relaxed problem to have a solution at all (ei=0e_i = 0ei​=0 or Ai=0A_i = 0Ai​=0 sends the optimal QiQ_iQi​ to ∞\infty∞ or 000), and it is what the book's own examples satisfy. The relaxed optimum enters the goal as a hypothesis, with existence stated separately; uniqueness is not used. The constant is the exact 1/(2ln⁡2)1/(\sqrt 2\ln 2)1/(2​ln2).

Two readings are excluded. The bound is not against an arbitrary nested QQQ, for which it would be false, but against the relaxed optimum; and the comparison class is stated as nested constant-batch policies, the class the relaxed problem bounds directly, not the book's larger class of time-varying policies, which would need a dynamic model. The definitions are reusable for assembly systems and for the joint replenishment problem of Sect. 7.3.1.2, whose Roundy analysis is the same with a fictive item 0 of zero holding cost; contributions in that direction are welcome.

Selected references

  • Sven Axsäter, Inventory Control, 3rd edition, International Series in Operations Research & Management Science 225, Springer, 2015, Sect. 9.2. DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-15729-0
  • Robin Roundy, 98%-Effective Integer-Ratio Lot-Sizing for One-Warehouse Multi-Retailer Systems, Management Science 31(11), 1985, pp. 1416-1430. DOI 10.1287/mnsc.31.11.1416
  • Robin Roundy, A 98%-Effective Lot-Sizing Rule for a Multi-Product, Multi-Stage Production/Inventory System, Mathematics of Operations Research 11(4), 1986, pp. 699-727. DOI 10.1287/moor.11.4.699
  • John A. Muckstadt and Robin O. Roundy, Analysis of Multistage Production Systems, in: Handbooks in Operations Research and Management Science 4, Elsevier, 1993, pp. 59-131. DOI 10.1016/S0927-0507(05)80182-4
  • Peter L. Jackson, William L. Maxwell and John A. Muckstadt, The Joint Replenishment Problem with a Powers-of-Two Restriction, IIE Transactions 17(1), 1985, pp. 25-32. DOI 10.1080/07408178508975268
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Inventory Control VI: Optimality of (R, Q) Policies When Ordering in BatchesTextbook

Why the policy class is not up for debate

Every model in Chapters 5 and 6 of Axsäter's Inventory Control assumes at the outset that the ordering policy is of (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) or (s,S)(s,S)(s,S) type. Section 6.2 asks whether better policies exist and answers, for the case in which there are no ordering costs but every order must be a multiple of a fixed batch quantity QQQ, that none do: Proposition 6.1, "an (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy is optimal", with a proof the book attributes to Chen (2000). For Q=1Q = 1Q=1 it is the optimality of an order-up-to-SSS policy in the absence of ordering costs, and for continuous or Poisson demand it transfers to (s,S)(s,S)(s,S) policies, which are then the same thing. The proposition is the one place in the book where a policy is compared against every feasible alternative rather than against other members of its own family, and its proof is short enough to be given in full, which makes it the natural capstone of Chapter 6.

Setting

Demand is compound Poisson: customers arrive according to a Poisson process with rate λ\lambdaλ and each demands an integral number of units, with sizes D0,D1,…D_0, D_1, \dotsD0​,D1​,… independent and identically distributed with law fff on the positive integers, independent of the arrival process. The book's standing assumption that not all demands are multiples of some integer larger than one is kept. Writing TnT_nTn​ for the nnn-th arrival time, N(t)N(t)N(t) for the number of arrivals by time ttt and Sn=D0+⋯+Dn−1S_n = D_0 + \dots + D_{n-1}Sn​=D0​+⋯+Dn−1​, the total demand by time ttt is SN(t)S_{N(t)}SN(t)​.

The replenishment lead-time LLL is constant and D(L)D(L)D(L), the demand over a lead-time, has law DDD. A holding cost h>0h > 0h>0 and a shortage cost b1>0b_1 > 0b1​>0 per unit and time unit are charged. There are no ordering costs, but all orders must be multiples of a given batch quantity Q≥1Q \ge 1Q≥1 and can only be triggered by customer demands. A policy is therefore any rule mmm that decides at each demand epoch how many batches to order; with initial position y0y_0y0​ the inventory position evolves as yn+1=yn−Dn+mnQy_{n+1} = y_n - D_n + m_nQyn+1​=yn​−Dn​+mn​Q (Eq. 6.22), and yt=yN(t)y_t = y_{N(t)}yt​=yN(t)​.

The standard argument of Sect. 5.3.2 gives the cost rate at time t+Lt + Lt+L as

g(yt),g(k)=−b1(k−μ′)+(h+b1)∑j=1kj Pr⁡[D(L)=k−j],g(y_t), \qquad g(k) = -b_1(k - \mu') + (h+b_1)\sum_{j=1}^{k} j\,\Pr[D(L) = k - j],g(yt​),g(k)=−b1​(k−μ′)+(h+b1​)j=1∑k​jPr[D(L)=k−j],

the expected holding-plus-shortage cost rate of an inventory level k−D(L)k - D(L)k−D(L) (Eq. 6.20), which is convex in kkk with g(k)→∞g(k) \to \inftyg(k)→∞ as ∣k∣→∞|k| \to \infty∣k∣→∞. The band cost is gˉ(y)=∑j=1Qg(y+j)\bar g(y) = \sum_{j=1}^{Q} g(y+j)gˉ​(y)=∑j=1Q​g(y+j) and RRR denotes an integer minimizing gˉ\bar ggˉ​. The (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy orders, as soon as the position is at or below RRR, the smallest number of batches that brings it above RRR; its position lives in the band {R+1,…,R+Q}\{R+1, \dots, R+Q\}{R+1,…,R+Q} from the first order on. The performance measure is the long-run average cost rate 1T∫0Tg(yt−L) dt\frac{1}{T}\int_0^T g(y_{t-L})\,\mathrm{d}tT1​∫0T​g(yt−L​)dt as T→∞T \to \inftyT→∞.

Formalization targets

Goal — Proposition 6.1

Almost surely, (1) for every policy mmm and every y0y_0y0​,

lim inf⁡T→∞1T∫0Tg(yt−Lm) dt  ≥  gˉ(R)Q,\liminf_{T\to\infty} \frac{1}{T}\int_0^T g\big(y^{m}_{t-L}\big)\,\mathrm{d}t \;\ge\; \frac{\bar g(R)}{Q},T→∞liminf​T1​∫0T​g(yt−Lm​)dt≥Qgˉ​(R)​,

and (2) the (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy attains it:

1T∫0Tg(yt−L(R,Q)) dt  ⟶  gˉ(R)Q.\frac{1}{T}\int_0^T g\big(y^{(R,Q)}_{t-L}\big)\,\mathrm{d}t \;\longrightarrow\; \frac{\bar g(R)}{Q}.T1​∫0T​g(yt−L(R,Q)​)dt⟶Qgˉ​(R)​.

Supporting targets

Lemma 6.1, that x↦g(z+xQ)x \mapsto g(z + xQ)x↦g(z+xQ) is convex and minimized at the representative of zzz in the band; the closed form of the (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) position, y0−Sny_0 - S_ny0​−Sn​ until the first order and the band representative of y0−Sny_0 - S_ny0​−Sn​ afterwards; the uniform occupation of the band by the reduced process yt′y_t'yt′​, the book's "the steady state distribution can be shown to be uniform", and its consequence that the long-run average of g(yt′)g(y_t')g(yt′​) is gˉ(R)/Q\bar g(R)/Qgˉ​(R)/Q; Proposition 5.1 in the same ergodic form for the (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy; and the two halves of the goal as separate statements.

Significance

The result itself. Proposition 6.1 is what licenses the two-parameter policies on which the rest of the book's single-echelon theory is built, and it does so for the practically important case of batch ordering (pallets, containers, production lots). Its proof also explains why the policy works: the only quantity a policy controls is the residue class of the inventory position modulo QQQ, which no policy can influence, and the position within that class, which the (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy always sets to the cheapest possible value. The book extends the same reasoning to other cost structures and to periodic review.

Formalizing it. The proposition is a theorem about the class of all policies, and the book's proof is pathwise: Lemma 6.1 compares any policy with the reduced process instant by instant, and an ergodic statement about the reduced process does the rest. Formalizing it therefore forces the policy class, the demand process and the long-run average to be written down exactly, which the book never does. Nothing here is open; no statement has a machine-checked proof yet.

Difficulty

The pointwise comparison is elementary once Lemma 6.1 is available, and Lemma 6.1 is discrete convexity. The difficulty is entirely in the ergodic statement: that the reduced position yt′=y_t' = yt′​= (the band representative of y0−SN(t)y_0 - S_{N(t)}y0​−SN(t)​) spends a fraction 1/Q1/Q1/Q of the time at each point of the band, almost surely. In discrete time this is the convergence of occupation frequencies for an irreducible random walk on Z/QZ\mathbb{Z}/Q\mathbb{Z}Z/QZ with step law fff modulo QQQ, where irreducibility is exactly the aperiodicity assumption on fff, and the book's double-stochasticity argument (Eq. 5.33-5.34) identifies the uniform law as stationary. Passing to continuous time adds the exponential holding times: the time average is the arrival average weighted by i.i.d. holding times independent of the walk, which a strong law of large numbers turns back into the discrete statement. Mathlib has the strong law and the exponential law but no ergodic theorem for finite Markov chains, so that is the groundwork a solver must build. The naive route through the stationary distribution of the embedded chain at demand epochs is not enough on its own: for pure Poisson demand that chain is periodic, and the book itself notes it.

Formalization scope

A CompoundPoissonDemand on a probability space packages the rate, the size law with f0=0f_0 = 0f0​=0 and the aperiodicity condition, and two sequences of random variables, the gaps and the sizes, with their laws (expMeasure lam, the given pmf), independence within each sequence, and independence between the sequences. Arrival times are partial sums of the gaps, count t is the supremum of {n:Tn≤t}\{n : T_n \le t\}{n:Tn​≤t}, and cumDemand n is the partial sum of the sizes. A policy is a function m : ℕ → Ω → ℕ with no measurability requirement; ipPath and ipAt are the position after the nnn-th demand and at time ttt; rqIP and rqOrders are the (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy, with a theorem identifying rqOrders as a policy in the general sense. avgCost is 1T∫0Tg(yt−L) dt\frac{1}{T}\int_0^T g(y_{t-L})\,\mathrm{d}tT1​∫0T​g(yt−L​)dt with ys=y0y_s = y_0ys​=y0​ for s<0s < 0s<0. The cost function ggg is sPolicyCost from the previous mission, applied to a DiscreteDemand that the hypotheses tie to the process as the law of the demand in (0,L](0, L](0,L].

Conventions: Q≥1Q \ge 1Q≥1, L≥0L \ge 0L≥0, h,b1>0h, b_1 > 0h,b1​>0; RRR is any minimizer of gˉ\bar ggˉ​ (it exists by the divergence of ggg, proved in the previous mission); y0y_0y0​ is arbitrary. count and the interval integral take junk values on the null set where arrivals do not tend to infinity, which the almost-sure conclusions absorb. "lim inf⁡≥c\liminf \ge climinf≥c" is stated as "for every ε>0\varepsilon > 0ε>0, eventually ≥c−ε\ge c - \varepsilon≥c−ε", avoiding a liminf on R\mathbb{R}R that could be junk.

Two readings that would trivialize the goal are excluded: the lower bound is over every rule, not over stationary or measurable ones, and the achievability half is a genuine limit, not a bound. The demand model and the occupation-frequency theorems are reusable for Proposition 10.1 and the batch-ordering models of Sect. 10.5; contributions establishing the ergodic theorem for irreducible chains on a finite cyclic group are welcome and would close most of this mission.

Selected references

  • Sven Axsäter, Inventory Control, 3rd edition, International Series in Operations Research & Management Science 225, Springer, 2015, Sects. 5.3.1 and 6.2.1. DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-15729-0
  • Fangruo Chen, Optimal Policies for Multi-Echelon Inventory Problems with Batch Ordering, Operations Research 48(3), 2000, pp. 376-389. DOI 10.1287/opre.48.3.376.12427
  • Awi Federgruen and Yu-Sheng Zheng, An Efficient Algorithm for Computing an Optimal (r,Q)(r,Q)(r,Q) Policy in Continuous Review Stochastic Inventory Systems, Operations Research 40(4), 1992, pp. 808-813. DOI 10.1287/opre.40.4.808
  • Evan L. Porteus, Foundations of Stochastic Inventory Theory, Stanford University Press, 2002.
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Inventory Control V: Joint Optimization of Reorder Point and Batch QuantityTextbook

Two decisions that are usually taken separately

An (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy has two parameters. Chapter 4 of Axsäter's Inventory Control chooses the batch quantity QQQ from a deterministic model, and Chapter 5 chooses the reorder point RRR from a stochastic one with QQQ held fixed; the book presents this two-step practice as an adequate approximation. Section 6.1 asks what is lost by it and shows how to optimize both parameters jointly in one stochastic model. For discrete demand the answer, due to Federgruen and Zheng (1992), is an algorithm of remarkable simplicity: increase QQQ one unit at a time, keep the reorder point optimal along the way by a one-line rule, and stop at the first QQQ for which the cost goes up. The claim that this stopping rule finds the global optimum over all pairs (R,Q)(R, Q)(R,Q) is the capstone of Sect. 6.1.1.1 and the goal of this mission. The same idea is reused in the book for (s,S)(s,S)(s,S) policies (Sect. 6.1.1.2) and, in continuous form, for normally distributed demand (Sect. 6.1.2).

Setting

An item is controlled by a continuous review (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy with integral reorder point RRR and batch quantity Q≥1Q \ge 1Q≥1. Demand is discrete and stationary; the lead-time demand D(L)D(L)D(L) takes values in the nonnegative integers with probabilities pj=Pr⁡[D(L)=j]p_j = \Pr[D(L) = j]pj​=Pr[D(L)=j] and has a finite mean μ′\mu'μ′. The average demand per unit of time is μ\muμ. Costs are a holding cost hhh and a shortage cost b1b_1b1​, both per unit and time unit, and an ordering cost AAA per batch.

The building block is the cost of an (S−1,S)(S-1,S)(S−1,S) policy that keeps the inventory position at a fixed integer kkk. By the standard argument of Sect. 5.3.2 the inventory level a lead-time later is k−D(L)k - D(L)k−D(L), and the average holding and shortage cost rate is (Eq. 6.3)

g(k)  =  −b1 (k−μ′)+(h+b1)∑j=1kj Pr⁡[D(L)=k−j].g(k) \;=\; -b_1\,(k - \mu') + (h + b_1)\sum_{j=1}^{k} j\,\Pr[D(L) = k - j].g(k)=−b1​(k−μ′)+(h+b1​)j=1∑k​jPr[D(L)=k−j].

Under the (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy the inventory position is uniformly distributed on {R+1,…,R+Q}\{R+1, \dots, R+Q\}{R+1,…,R+Q} (Proposition 5.1), so the total average cost rate is (Eq. 6.4)

C(R,Q)  =  AμQ+1Q∑k=R+1R+Qg(k),C(R, Q) \;=\; \frac{A\mu}{Q} + \frac{1}{Q}\sum_{k=R+1}^{R+Q} g(k),C(R,Q)=QAμ​+Q1​k=R+1∑R+Q​g(k),

and C(Q)=min⁡RC(R,Q)C(Q) = \min_R C(R,Q)C(Q)=minR​C(R,Q) (Eq. 6.5), attained at an optimal reorder point R∗(Q)R^{*}(Q)R∗(Q). The ready rate S3(R)=Pr⁡[IL>0]=1Q∑k=R+1R+QPr⁡[D(L)≤k−1]S_3(R) = \Pr[IL > 0] = \frac{1}{Q}\sum_{k=R+1}^{R+Q}\Pr[D(L) \le k-1]S3​(R)=Pr[IL>0]=Q1​∑k=R+1R+Q​Pr[D(L)≤k−1] links the cost to service: raising the reorder point by one unit changes the cost by −b1+(h+b1)S3(R+1)-b_1 + (h + b_1)S_3(R+1)−b1​+(h+b1​)S3​(R+1) (Eq. 5.60).

Formalization targets

Goal — the Federgruen-Zheng stopping rule is optimal

Let Q∗≥1Q^{*} \ge 1Q∗≥1 be the smallest batch quantity with C(Q∗+1)≥C(Q∗)C(Q^{*}+1) \ge C(Q^{*})C(Q∗+1)≥C(Q∗) and let R∗R^{*}R∗ be an optimal reorder point for Q∗Q^{*}Q∗. Then

C(R∗,Q∗)  ≤  C(R,Q)for all R∈Z, Q≥1.C(R^{*}, Q^{*}) \;\le\; C(R, Q) \qquad\text{for all } R \in \mathbb{Z},\ Q \ge 1.C(R∗,Q∗)≤C(R,Q)for all R∈Z, Q≥1.

Supporting targets

The increment identity g(k+1)−g(k)=−b1+(h+b1)Pr⁡[D(L)≤k]g(k+1) - g(k) = -b_1 + (h+b_1)\Pr[D(L) \le k]g(k+1)−g(k)=−b1​+(h+b1​)Pr[D(L)≤k]; convexity of ggg on Z\mathbb{Z}Z together with g(k)→∞g(k) \to \inftyg(k)→∞ as ∣k∣→∞|k| \to \infty∣k∣→∞; Eq. (5.60) and the convexity of C(⋅,Q)C(\cdot, Q)C(⋅,Q) in RRR; Eq. (5.61), that the largest RRR with S3(R)≤b1/(h+b1)S_3(R) \le b_1/(h+b_1)S3​(R)≤b1​/(h+b1​) is optimal for its QQQ; existence of an optimal RRR for every QQQ; the recursion (6.6)-(6.7), R∗(Q+1)∈{R∗(Q)−1,R∗(Q)}R^{*}(Q+1) \in \{R^{*}(Q) - 1, R^{*}(Q)\}R∗(Q+1)∈{R∗(Q)−1,R∗(Q)} chosen by comparing g(R∗(Q))g(R^{*}(Q))g(R∗(Q)) with g(R∗(Q)+Q+1)g(R^{*}(Q)+Q+1)g(R∗(Q)+Q+1), and C(Q+1)=C(Q)QQ+1+min⁡{g(R∗(Q)),g(R∗(Q)+Q+1)}1Q+1C(Q+1) = C(Q)\frac{Q}{Q+1} + \min\{g(R^{*}(Q)), g(R^{*}(Q)+Q+1)\}\frac{1}{Q+1}C(Q+1)=C(Q)Q+1Q​+min{g(R∗(Q)),g(R∗(Q)+Q+1)}Q+11​; the equivalence C(Q+1)≥C(Q)  ⟺  min⁡{⋅}≥C(Q)C(Q+1) \ge C(Q) \iff \min\{\cdot\} \ge C(Q)C(Q+1)≥C(Q)⟺min{⋅}≥C(Q) and the monotonicity of that minimum in QQQ; and the existence of some QQQ at which the costs stop decreasing.

Significance

The result itself. Joint optimization typically enlarges the batch and lowers the reorder point relative to the two-step procedure, and the book's Example 6.1 puts the resulting cost saving at a few percent. The Federgruen-Zheng procedure makes the exact joint optimum for discrete demand as cheap to compute as the two-step approximation, because each step of the recursion evaluates ggg at two points. It is the exact benchmark against which the book's approximate techniques for normal demand (Sects. 6.1.2 and 6.1.3) are judged, and its structural core, that the optimal window of QQQ consecutive inventory positions grows one neighbour at a time, is the discrete-convexity fact behind the whole of Sect. 6.1.

Formalizing it. The mathematics is settled. What the mission produces is a Lean development in which the steps the book marks "evident" and "obvious" are separate statements: that the recursion preserves optimality, that the marginal cost of enlarging the batch is monotone, and that a minimum over RRR exists at all. None of the statements has a machine-checked proof yet.

Difficulty

The obvious first idea, to argue that C(Q)C(Q)C(Q) is convex in QQQ and stop at its first increase, does not work as stated: C(Q)C(Q)C(Q) is a minimum over RRR of a ratio and is not convex in general. What is true, and what the proof uses, is that the marginal cost (Q+1)C(Q+1)−QC(Q)(Q+1)C(Q+1) - QC(Q)(Q+1)C(Q+1)−QC(Q) is nondecreasing, because it equals the smaller of the two ggg-values adjacent to the optimal window. Establishing the recursion (6.6) is where discrete convexity is needed: one must show that the best window of Q+1Q+1Q+1 consecutive positions is obtained from the best window of QQQ by adding a neighbour, which fails for non-convex ggg. The window sums R↦∑k=R+1R+Qg(k)R \mapsto \sum_{k=R+1}^{R+Q} g(k)R↦∑k=R+1R+Q​g(k) are themselves convex in RRR with increments g(R+Q+1)−g(R+1)g(R+Q+1) - g(R+1)g(R+Q+1)−g(R+1), and the argument compares a competing window with the optimal one through the end terms. The remaining steps are finite algebra and an induction on QQQ from Q∗Q^{*}Q∗.

Formalization scope

A DiscreteDemand is a function p:N→Rp : \mathbb{N} \to \mathbb{R}p:N→R with p≥0p \ge 0p≥0, ∑p=1\sum p = 1∑p=1 and a summable first moment; Pr⁡[D(L)≤k]\Pr[D(L) \le k]Pr[D(L)≤k] is a finite sum over 0≤j≤k0 \le j \le k0≤j≤k, empty for k<0k < 0k<0. The reorder point ranges over Z\mathbb{Z}Z and the batch quantity over N\mathbb{N}N, with Q≥1Q \ge 1Q≥1 assumed in every statement because Lean's division by 000 is 000. Convexity of a function on Z\mathbb{Z}Z is stated as nondecreasing increments, and divergence as Tendsto g (cocompact ℤ) atTop.

C(Q)C(Q)C(Q) enters the goal as a function CQ together with the hypothesis that CQ Q is the least value of R↦C(R,Q)R \mapsto C(R, Q)R↦C(R,Q); the stopping index Q∗Q^{*}Q∗ is characterized by the two conditions that define "the smallest QQQ with C(Q+1)≥C(Q)C(Q+1) \ge C(Q)C(Q+1)≥C(Q)", and R∗R^{*}R∗ by optimality at Q∗Q^{*}Q∗. That these objects exist is the content of two separate items, so the goal is not vacuous: a minimum over RRR exists for every QQQ because g→∞g \to \inftyg→∞, and the costs cannot decrease forever because the average of the QQQ smallest values of ggg tends to infinity. The positivity of AAA and μ\muμ is the book's setting and is assumed where it appears.

The uniform inventory position of Proposition 5.1, which needs the book's assumption that not all demands are multiples of an integer larger than one, is taken as given in the cost formula (6.4), as the book does; the proposition itself is the subject of the next mission of this series. The definitions are reusable for the (s,S)(s,S)(s,S) optimization of Sect. 6.1.1.2 and for the multi-echelon batch-ordering results of Sect. 10.5; contributions formalizing the Zheng-Federgruen (s,S)(s,S)(s,S) algorithm on top of them are welcome.

Selected references

  • Sven Axsäter, Inventory Control, 3rd edition, International Series in Operations Research & Management Science 225, Springer, 2015, Sects. 5.9.1 and 6.1.1. DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-15729-0
  • Awi Federgruen and Yu-Sheng Zheng, An Efficient Algorithm for Computing an Optimal (r,Q)(r,Q)(r,Q) Policy in Continuous Review Stochastic Inventory Systems, Operations Research 40(4), 1992, pp. 808-813. DOI 10.1287/opre.40.4.808
  • Yu-Sheng Zheng and Awi Federgruen, Finding Optimal (s,S)(s,S)(s,S) Policies Is About as Simple as Evaluating a Single Policy, Operations Research 39(4), 1991, pp. 654-665. DOI 10.1287/opre.39.4.654
  • Paul Zipkin, Foundations of Inventory Management, McGraw-Hill, 2000.
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Operations ResearchOptimizationProbability·Captain: naimengye

Inventory Control IV: Reorder Points under Normally Distributed DemandTextbook

Where the reorder point comes from

Chapter 4 of Axsäter's Inventory Control fixes the batch quantity QQQ from a deterministic model, and Chapter 5 asks the question that deterministic models cannot answer: with demand random and a replenishment lead-time LLL, when should the next batch be ordered? Under a continuous review (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy the answer is a single number, the reorder point RRR, and Sections 5.3 through 5.9 are one sustained computation of what a given RRR buys. The chapter's own capstone is Eq. (5.67): if backorders are charged at b1b_1b1​ per unit and time unit and stock at hhh, the cost-minimizing reorder point is exactly the one whose fill rate is b1/(h+b1)b_1/(h+b_1)b1​/(h+b1​). The book calls the relationship "even more striking" than its discrete counterpart, and it is used in practice in both directions: a backorder cost prescribes a service level, and a chosen service level reveals the backorder cost a planner is implicitly assuming (Eq. 5.68).

Setting

An order for a fixed batch quantity Q>0Q > 0Q>0 is triggered whenever the inventory position (stock on hand plus outstanding orders minus backorders) falls to the reorder point RRR, and it arrives LLL time units later. Demand is continuous and normally distributed; the demand over a lead-time has mean μ′\mu'μ′ and standard deviation σ′>0\sigma' > 0σ′>0. Two modelling facts from the book are taken as the definition of the steady state. First (Sect. 5.3.1), the inventory position IPIPIP is uniformly distributed on [R,R+Q][R, R+Q][R,R+Q]; the book proves this for compound Poisson demand (Proposition 5.1) and adopts it as an accurate approximation for continuous demand. Second (Sect. 5.3.2, Eq. 5.35), the inventory level a lead-time later is the inventory position now minus the demand in between,

IL(t+L)  =  IP(t)−D(t,t+L),IL(t+L) \;=\; IP(t) - D(t, t+L),IL(t+L)=IP(t)−D(t,t+L),

with the two terms independent. The law of ILILIL is therefore the image of the product of a uniform and a normal law under subtraction, and everything in the chapter is a functional of it:

  • the distribution function F(x)=Pr⁡[IL≤x]F(x) = \Pr[IL \le x]F(x)=Pr[IL≤x] and its density fff;
  • the ready rate S3=Pr⁡[IL>0]S_3 = \Pr[IL > 0]S3​=Pr[IL>0], which for continuous demand equals the fill rate S2S_2S2​, the fraction of demand met from stock on hand;
  • the expected cost rate C(R)=E[h (IL)++b1 (IL)−]C(R) = \mathbb{E}\big[h\,(IL)^{+} + b_1\,(IL)^{-}\big]C(R)=E[h(IL)++b1​(IL)−], holding cost on positive stock and backorder cost on negative stock, Eq. (5.56).

The closed forms run through the standard normal loss function G(x)=∫x∞(v−x)φ(v) dvG(x) = \int_x^\infty (v-x)\varphi(v)\,\mathrm{d}vG(x)=∫x∞​(v−x)φ(v)dv of Eq. (5.40), published with the newsboy mission and reused here, and through its integral, the second loss function H(x)=∫x∞G(v) dvH(x) = \int_x^\infty G(v)\,\mathrm{d}vH(x)=∫x∞​G(v)dv of Eq. (5.64). Both are tabulated in the book's Appendix 2, and both recur in Chapters 6, 9 and 10.

Formalization targets

Goal — Eq. (5.67)

For h,b1,Q,σ′>0h, b_1, Q, \sigma' > 0h,b1​,Q,σ′>0 and any μ′\mu'μ′, a reorder point RRR minimizes CCC over R\mathbb{R}R if and only if

S2(R)  =  S3(R)  =  b1h+b1.S_2(R) \;=\; S_3(R) \;=\; \frac{b_1}{h + b_1}.S2​(R)=S3​(R)=h+b1​b1​​.

The biconditional carries both halves of the book's sentence: the stationary point is the optimum ("the optimal RRR is obtained for dC/dR=0\mathrm{d}C/\mathrm{d}R = 0dC/dR=0") and the optimum is stationary ("in the optimal solution we have S2=S3=b1/(h+b1)S_2 = S_3 = b_1/(h+b_1)S2​=S3​=b1​/(h+b1​)").

Supporting targets

In the order the chapter builds them: Eq. (5.41), G′=Φ−1G' = \Phi - 1G′=Φ−1, with GGG decreasing and convex; Eq. (5.39), the distribution function by conditioning on the inventory position; Eq. (5.42), its closed form F(x)=σ′Q[G(R−x−μ′σ′)−G(R+Q−x−μ′σ′)]F(x) = \frac{\sigma'}{Q}[G(\frac{R-x-\mu'}{\sigma'}) - G(\frac{R+Q-x-\mu'}{\sigma'})]F(x)=Qσ′​[G(σ′R−x−μ′​)−G(σ′R+Q−x−μ′​)]; Eq. (5.43), the density; Eq. (5.52), the fill rate 1−σ′Q[G(R−μ′σ′)−G(R+Q−μ′σ′)]1 - \frac{\sigma'}{Q}[G(\frac{R-\mu'}{\sigma'}) - G(\frac{R+Q-\mu'}{\sigma'})]1−Qσ′​[G(σ′R−μ′​)−G(σ′R+Q−μ′​)]; Eq. (5.55), the expected backorders E(B)\mathbb{E}(B)E(B) covered by one batch, and Eq. (5.54), that 1−E(B)/Q1 - \mathbb{E}(B)/Q1−E(B)/Q is the same fill rate; integrability of the cost rate and the mean E(IL)=R+Q/2−μ′\mathbb{E}(IL) = R + Q/2 - \mu'E(IL)=R+Q/2−μ′; Eq. (5.63), E(IL)−=∫−∞0F\mathbb{E}(IL)^{-} = \int_{-\infty}^0 FE(IL)−=∫−∞0​F; Eq. (5.64), the closed form of HHH and H′=−GH' = -GH′=−G; Eq. (5.65), the cost C=h(R+Q/2−μ′)+(h+b1)σ′2Q[H(R−μ′σ′)−H(R+Q−μ′σ′)]C = h(R + Q/2 - \mu') + (h+b_1)\frac{\sigma'^2}{Q}[H(\frac{R-\mu'}{\sigma'}) - H(\frac{R+Q-\mu'}{\sigma'})]C=h(R+Q/2−μ′)+(h+b1​)Qσ′2​[H(σ′R−μ′​)−H(σ′R+Q−μ′​)]; Eq. (5.66), dC/dR=−b1+(h+b1)S2\mathrm{d}C/\mathrm{d}R = -b_1 + (h+b_1)S_2dC/dR=−b1​+(h+b1​)S2​; and the convexity of CCC in RRR.

Significance

The result itself. The reorder point is the one parameter of an (R,Q)(R,Q)(R,Q) policy that stochastic demand actually decides, and Eq. (5.67) says that deciding it by cost and deciding it by service level are the same decision, with an explicit dictionary between the two. That is why the book can present service-level constraints (Sect. 5.7) and shortage costs (Sect. 5.9) as interchangeable ways of specifying the same thing, and why it warns, immediately after Eq. (5.67), that the equivalence is only valid when QQQ is given: with an ordering cost and a joint optimization of RRR and QQQ it fails, which is Chapter 6's problem.

The intermediate formulas have independent standing. Eq. (5.42) is the single expression from which every service measure of the chapter is computed, and Eq. (5.65) is the cost function that Chapter 6 extends by an ordering cost, Eq. (6.10), and optimizes iteratively. The second loss function HHH returns in the periodic-review fill rate of Eq. (5.86) and in the two-echelon batch-ordering model of Sect. 10.5.

Formalizing it. Nothing here is open; the value is that the steady-state model becomes an explicit measure, so that formulas the book obtains by manipulating integrals whose existence it never questions become theorems about that measure. Integrability of the cost rate is a target of its own for exactly that reason. None of the statements has a machine-checked proof yet.

Difficulty

The obvious route is the book's, and it is not the hard part: once FFF is known in closed form, every later identity is calculus on GGG and HHH. The work is upstream of that. The distribution function (5.39) is a conditioning argument over the product measure, a Fubini step in which the inner probability is a Gaussian tail; the density (5.43) is a derivative of a parameter-dependent integral; and Eq. (5.63) exchanges the order of two integrals over an unbounded region, which needs integrability of ILILIL itself. The derivative (5.66) is then obtained from the closed form (5.65), not by differentiating under an expectation, which is what makes the goal reachable: CCC is a smooth function of RRR with an explicitly increasing derivative, and Eq. (5.67) follows from strict convexity together with the fact that the fill rate is a continuous, strictly increasing function of RRR ranging over (0,1)(0,1)(0,1). A solver who starts from the expectation and tries to differentiate it directly will meet the kink of x+x^{+}x+ at 000 and a dominated-convergence argument; the integrated route avoids both.

Formalization scope

The inventory position is rqPosition R Q, Lebesgue measure conditioned on [R,R+Q][R, R+Q][R,R+Q]; the lead-time demand is newsboyDemand m s, Mathlib's gaussianReal m (s^2).toNNReal from the newsboy mission, with m=μ′m = \mu'm=μ′ and s=σ′s = \sigma's=σ′; and rqLevel R Q m s is the pushforward of their product under (u,d)↦u−d(u, d) \mapsto u - d(u,d)↦u−d. Two lemmas in the definition file record that both are probability measures when Q>0Q > 0Q>0. The distribution function, ready rate and cost are the measure of (−∞,x](-\infty, x](−∞,x], the measure of (0,∞)(0, \infty)(0,∞), and a Bochner integral against this law.

Every statement assumes Q>0Q > 0Q>0 and σ′>0\sigma' > 0σ′>0. At Q=0Q = 0Q=0 the conditioned measure is the zero measure and every integral is 000, so a statement without the hypothesis would be true and empty; at σ′=0\sigma' = 0σ′=0 the demand is a point mass and FFF has jumps. The mean μ′\mu'μ′ is unrestricted, as none of the formulas depends on its sign, and reorder points may be negative, which the book explicitly allows in Sect. 5.8. Costs hhh and b1b_1b1​ are positive in every statement that involves them, and E(B)\mathbb{E}(B)E(B) is stated for Q≥0Q \ge 0Q≥0 because its closed form holds there.

Two trivializing readings are ruled out. The cost is not defined as a formula in HHH but as an expectation, so the closed form (5.65) has content; and because Lean's Bochner integral of a non-integrable function is 000, integrability of the cost rate is stated as a theorem rather than assumed, otherwise a zero cost would make every reorder point optimal. The goal quantifies optimality over all real competing reorder points, not a neighbourhood.

A complete development needs Gaussian tail integrals, differentiation of parameter-dependent integrals, Fubini on a product of a bounded interval with the line, and the strict monotonicity of the Gaussian distribution function. The loss functions GGG and HHH and the inventory-level law are reusable across the rest of the series; contributions that establish the same identities for an arbitrary continuous lead-time demand with a finite mean, where Eqs. (5.39), (5.63) and (5.66) hold verbatim, are welcome.

Selected references

  • Sven Axsäter, Inventory Control, 3rd edition, International Series in Operations Research & Management Science 225, Springer, 2015, Sects. 5.3, 5.7, 5.8 and 5.9. DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-15729-0
  • George Hadley and Thomson M. Whitin, Analysis of Inventory Systems, Prentice-Hall, 1963.
  • Paul Zipkin, Foundations of Inventory Management, McGraw-Hill, 2000.
  • Yu-Sheng Zheng, On Properties of Stochastic Inventory Systems, Management Science 38(1), 1992, pp. 87-103. DOI 10.1287/mnsc.38.1.87
  • Kaj Rosling, Inventory Cost Rate Functions with Nonlinear Shortage Costs, Operations Research 50(6), 2002, pp. 1007-1017. DOI 10.1287/opre.50.6.1007.346
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AlgebraNumber Theory·Captain: tomasz

Philippon: Multiplicity estimates in commutative algebraic groupsResearch Paper

Why multiplicity estimates matter

Formalization status, 10 October 2026: all eight milestones are complete. Both corrected addenda are Proved. The subgroup upper Hilbert estimate has an accepted proof with eight Proved inputs and no Open dependencies (submission 07198c4c-ea10-4c9a-89b8-b4a5319c40b5). Together with the accepted sharp contact-rank and ambient lower Hilbert bounds, this discharges every dependency of the corrected converse. The corrected 26-part full-paper goal remains Open, with exactly two frontier leaves: quadratic parameter-stalk germs and the local complex model for the closure action. The common-shift forward conclusion, quadratic first-input addition hypothesis in the converse, all constants and degree thresholds, and all 24 unaffected goal clauses are unchanged. The separately published Chardin theorem in arbitrary characteristic remains Open; it is no longer required by this mission proof.

An auxiliary polynomial in a transcendence proof is constructed to vanish to high order at many points. A multiplicity estimate limits how often that can happen without a geometric reason: a positive-dimensional algebraic subgroup can make the apparent vanishing conditions dependent. Such estimates are used to turn analytic approximations into algebraic-independence conclusions. The theory applies to products of commutative algebraic groups with both archimedean and nonarchimedean analytic directions.

The mission's objective is a faithful formalization of the complete 1986 paper, Patrice Philippon's Lemmes de zéros dans les groupes algébriques commutatifs, including every theorem, corollary, proposition, lemma, definition, and mathematical supporting claim. All results remain required whether or not a current application uses them. Necessary source corrections are explicit and their counterexamples remain part of the completion goal. The author's 1987 corrections are applied transparently, and the addendum's additional results are recorded separately (original, errata and addenda).

Groups, analytic directions, and geometric degree

Let K be the complex field or the completed algebraic closure of the field of ℓ-adic numbers for a prime ℓ, as in the source. Let G be a product of finitely many commutative algebraic groups G₁,…,Gᵣ over K, with each factor embedded as a quasi-projective variety in a projective space. Write n for the sum of their dimensions. A point of the product embedding has one block of homogeneous coordinates for each factor.

A nonzero multihomogeneous polynomial P has a degree Dᵢ in its i-th block of coordinates. Its zeros define a hypersurface of the ambient product of projective spaces. An analytic subgroup A is locally parametrized by an analytic homomorphism from a finite-dimensional additive K-space. The order of P along A at a group point g is the vanishing order of P after composing local projective coordinates with the translated parametrization. This definition must be independent of the choice of nonzero local coordinate representatives.

Let Σ be a finite set of group points containing the identity. Its n-fold sumset Σ(n) consists of all sums of n, not necessarily distinct, elements of Σ; Σ(0) is the singleton identity. For a connected algebraic subgroup H, the integer s is the analytic codimension of A∩H in A. The expression |(Σ+H)/H| counts distinct H-cosets meeting Σ. Codimension concerns the analytic tangent dimension; it does not assert that the point-set intersection is finite.

The source's Hilbert degree form ℋ(V;D₁,…,Dᵣ) is (dim V)! times the highest homogeneous part of the multigraded Hilbert–Samuel polynomial of the projective closure of V, evaluated at the degrees. It must be constructed from the coordinate ring, rather than supplied as an arbitrary numerical function. For one projective factor it is deg(V)D^(dim V). These definitions are fixed in §§2–3 of the original paper.

Formalization targets

The completion target is all results of the paper, with an aggregate goal that requires their individual formal statements. Theorem 2.1 is one milestone within that target. For each fixed family of embedded group factors, it chooses positive integers cᵢ, each depending only on its corresponding embedding. These constants precede the analytic subgroup, the finite sampling set, the polynomial degrees, the polynomial, and the contact parameter T. If P has order at least nT+1 along A at every point of Σ(n), there is a connected algebraic subgroup H with

(T+ss) ∣(Σ+H)/H∣ H(H;D1,…,Dr)≤H(G;c1D1,…,crDr).\binom{T+s}{s}\, |(\Sigma+H)/H|\, \mathcal H(H;D_1,\ldots,D_r) \leq \mathcal H(G;c_1D_1,\ldots,c_rD_r).(sT+s​)∣(Σ+H)/H∣H(H;D1​,…,Dr​)≤H(G;c1​D1​,…,cr​Dr​).

The same H is contained in a translate of the zero locus of P on G and is incompletely defined by equations of multidegrees at most (c₁D₁,…,cᵣDᵣ): it is an irreducible component of the common zero locus in G of equations with those degree bounds. Both geometric conclusions are part of the target. A formalization retaining only the displayed numerical inequality would omit part of the original result.

The 1986 paper has 13 numbered results. Section 2 contains Theorem 2.1 and Corollaries 2.2–2.3, including the one-dimensional analytic result and the result for disjoint group factors. Section 3 contains Lemmas 3.1–3.2, Proposition 3.3 and Lemma 3.4. Section 4 contains Propositions 4.3–4.4, Lemmas 4.5–4.6 and Proposition 4.7. Section 5 contains Lemma 5.1. Every clause of these statements belongs to the mission.

Definitions 3.5, 4.1 and 4.2, the unnumbered setup, the internal Facts A–E, the counterexample after Proposition 3.3, and the mathematical claims in remarks also require coverage. Source numbers and page references identify the correspondence between the prose and Lean declarations. The two 1987 addendum targets are explicitly corrected variants. The forward statement assumes ambient connectedness and allows one common shift v∈Gv\in Gv∈G, so g+v+H⊆{P=0}∩Gg+v+H\subseteq\{P=0\}\cap Gg+v+H⊆{P=0}∩G for every sampled ggg, with the same connected subgroup HHH satisfying incomplete definition and the full coset-count inequality. Its embedding-dependent constants are chosen before the sample and polynomial. This is not an exact transcription of the printed strengthening. The converse assumes ambient connectedness and explicit local addition formulas of degree at most two in the first input for every embedded factor. Its subgroup may remain disconnected; the degree threshold, constant 1/(4nn!)1/(4^n n!)1/(4nn!), and polynomial nonzero somewhere on GGG are unchanged. All original sampling and contact assumptions remain. No desired estimate is encoded as a geometric assumption.

Eight milestones and the completion goal

The completion goal is PhilipponMultiplicity.paper_results_corrected_erratum, a conjunction of 26 concrete propositions. This is a collection goal requiring the source statements and the additional mathematical claims in the coverage record. It is separate from the paper's original Theorem 2.1, which remains individually named and reusable.

The mission has eight milestones; seven are currently Proved:

SourceMilestoneStatus
Theorem 2.1General multiplicity estimate, with every geometric and numerical conclusion.Proved
Corollary 2.2One-dimensional analytic-subgroup consequence.Proved
Corollary 2.3Consequence for disjoint group factors and sampling grids.Proved
Proposition 3.3Multigraded intersection bounds, including the multiplicity-sensitive bound.Proved
Proposition 4.7Binomial lower bound for contact multiplicity.Proved
Lemma 5.1Stabilizer construction and the geometric counting estimate.Proved
1987 addendum, p. 398Corrected common-shift vanishing in a connected ambient group.Proved
1987 addendum, p. 398Connected converse with first-input addition degree at most two.Open

The full statement package has 27 compiled theorem statements: all thirteen numbered results, both addenda, eleven supporting or correction targets, and the aggregate goal. The fourteen original admission-free definition bundles and one erratum supplement supply their actual geometric and algebraic objects. All 41 original statement and definition items have independent blind readbacks. The eight milestones above retain their existing identities.

The supporting clauses include Hilbert-polynomial existence, primary components and Facts A–E; the geometric interpretation of mixed degree; the actual counterexample after Proposition 3.3; translation operators and their comparison with intrinsic ideals; contact invariance; translation-invariance and embedding remarks; the component/stabilizer construction; counting estimates; and the exact Masser–Wüstholz Theorem I consequence claimed on p.361. Proof-internal recursive ideals and tangent/exponential arguments belong to their corresponding theorem proofs.

Source corrections are visible for review. Lemma 3.1 and Corollary 2.2 require positive equation degrees; explicit zero-degree counterexamples are required goal clauses. Both addenda require positive ambient dimension; the goal also requires their dimension-zero counterexamples. The three-generator ideal printed on p.370 is nonradical, contrary to the printed word “prime”; its valid degree-four versus length-six counterexample is preserved, together with an explicit nilpotent witness. Connectedness is stated in the translation-invariance and Lange reembedding remarks. These are mathematical corrections documented during the source comparison, beyond the author's 1987 errata. They are not silent changes to the source.

Existing completed proofs and all 24 unaffected goal clauses are retained. The corrected forward addendum is Proved. The repaired converse and the replacement collection goal remain Open; two general geometry lemmas also remain on the frontier. The existing proved local-algebra references remain reusable ingredients.

What a completed formalization enables

The output is a reusable development of the paper's multigraded commutative algebra, translation and differential operators, geometric multiplicity theory, and zero estimates. All source results are required for completion. A downstream Weierstrass application can consume a specialization of Theorem 2.1; its needs do not determine the scope or completion of this mission (example application).

These are established mathematical results whose proofs are being formalized. The complete original Theorem 2.1 has an accepted proof. The selected Weierstrass application uses individually named Philippon results, with its application-specific model and subgroup bridges proved in the Senthil mission. The remaining general results stay required even though that application is complete.

The foundational difficulty

Vanishing conditions need not be independent: many can occur on the same component or on translates with a nontrivial stabilizer. Counting coefficients of P therefore does not bound their total multiplicity. The development needs geometric degree for actual components, multiplicities measured by lengths of localized quotient rings, and uniform control of translations in fixed projective embeddings.

Proposition 3.3 supplies multigraded intersection bounds, Proposition 4.7 controls contact multiplicity, and Lemma 5.1 connects the stabilizer to the geometric counting estimate. These three results and Theorem 2.1 now have checked proofs. The remaining corollaries, general geometric and analytic claims, examples and addenda are independent deliverables. Application-specific contact results do not discharge the remaining general statements.

Formalization scope

The declarations use the namespace PhilipponMultiplicity. Source statements retain their conclusions, constants, quantifier order, and complex or ℓ-adic scope, with the visible boundary and wording corrections listed above. Intermediate specializations are labelled as such and do not discharge a more general source result. Natural-number and zero-degree conventions have been compared with the original scans; the discovered failures and corrected hypotheses are recorded explicitly for human review. Corrections and inferred conventions must be documented rather than silently changing the source.

The required definitions include embedded commutative algebraic groups and their connected subgroups; products of projective spaces and multihomogeneous coordinate rings; analytic local homomorphisms and intrinsic contact order; multigraded Hilbert polynomials and their degree forms; local component lengths; and finite coset counts. No model may assume the desired multiplicity inequality, hide it as a structure field, or replace geometric degree by an unconstrained function.

The 26 individual target statements, replacement collection goal, original definition bundles, and erratum supplement compile in Lean 4.33.1 with Mathlib revision 0df444a360eaa60ab8c11dca51a86af692955474. Source comparisons and independent readbacks document the fixed statements and their explicit corrections. The goal remains the concrete 26-part full-paper collection. The completed proofs supply reusable Hilbert theory, primary-component multiplicities, polynomial differential operators, bounded translation atlases and the Section 5 construction. Contributions to the remaining targets, including results unused by Senthil, complete the original scope.

The previous aggregate, original sampled-translates addendum, and original converse remain available with their prior submissions and disproofs. The replacement statements changed the mission goal explicitly before proofs were supplied. The corrected common-shift forward statement has since received an accepted proof.

Selected references

  • P. Philippon, Lemmes de zéros dans les groupes algébriques commutatifs, Bulletin de la Société Mathématique de France 114 (1986), 355–383. DOI and original paper.
  • P. Philippon, Errata et addenda à « Lemmes de zéros dans les groupes algébriques commutatifs », Bulletin de la Société Mathématique de France 115 (1987), 397–398. DOI and addendum.
  • Senthil Kumar K, Algebraic independence of values of Weierstrass elliptic and zeta functions, Proceedings of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society (2026), including Robert Tubbs's appendix. DOI.
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CombinatoricsOperations Research·Captain: naimengye

Complex Scheduling III: Interval Consistency Tests for the RCPSPTextbook

Motivation

Exact methods for the resource-constrained project scheduling problem — branch-and-bound over activity lists or over start-time assignments, and the lower-bound computations inside them — live or die by how much of the search space can be discarded before it is enumerated. The standard tool is constraint propagation: deducing, from the precedence, resource and time-window data, new precedence relations i→ji\to ji→j that every feasible schedule must satisfy, and tighter time windows for the activities. Brucker and Knust's Section 3.6 (doi:10.1007/978-3-642-23929-8) presents the family of interval consistency tests — input, output, input-or-output and their negations — that constraint-programming schedulers apply at every node of the search, following Carlier and Pinson (An algorithm for solving the job-shop problem, Management Science 35, 1989, doi:10.1287/mnsc.35.2.164) and Baptiste, Le Pape and Nuijten (Constraint-Based Scheduling, Kluwer, 2001, doi:10.1007/978-1-4615-1479-4). Every test is an instance of one theorem, Theorem 3.7, and its cumulative-resource analogue, Theorem 3.8. Those two theorems, and the tests as their corollaries, are this mission.

Setting

The instance is the RCPSP of mission I: activities 0,…,n−10,\dots,n-10,…,n−1 with integer processing times pip_ipi​, renewable resources kkk with capacities RkR_kRk​ and demands rikr_{ik}rik​, and precedence arcs; a schedule is an integer start-time vector SSS, feasible when it meets the precedences and never exceeds a capacity. Section 3.6 adds three things.

Relations. A conjunction i→ji\to ji→j holds in SSS when Si+pi≤SjS_i+p_i\le S_jSi​+pi​≤Sj​. Two activities are parallel, i∥ji\parallel ji∥j, when they overlap for at least one time unit, and a disjunction i−ji-ji−j is the negation of that: i→ji\to ji→j or j→ij\to ij→i. The instance carries a set CCC of conjunctions and a set DDD of disjunctions that every feasible schedule must satisfy; initially C0C_0C0​ is the precedence relation and D0D_0D0​ the pairs whose combined demand exceeds some capacity, and propagation adds to them.

Disjunctive sets. A set III of at least two activities is disjunctive when any two of its members are related by a disjunction or a conjunction, so no two are ever processed together: the activities of a unit-capacity resource, the jobs of a single machine, the operations of one job in a shop. Its total processing time is P(I)=∑i∈IpiP(I)=\sum_{i\in I}p_iP(I)=∑i∈I​pi​.

Time windows. Each activity has a head rir_iri​ and a deadline did_idi​, and a feasible schedule has ri≤Sir_i\le S_iri​≤Si​ and Si+pi≤diS_i+p_i\le d_iSi​+pi​≤di​. An activity starts first in a set JJJ when no activity of JJJ starts earlier, and ends last when none completes later.

For a cumulative resource kkk the work of activity iii is wi=rikpiw_i=r_{ik}p_iwi​=rik​pi​ and W(J)=∑i∈JwiW(J)=\sum_{i\in J}w_iW(J)=∑i∈J​wi​.

Formalization targets

Goal — Theorem 3.7 (printed p. 169)

Let III be a disjunctive set, J⊆IJ\subseteq IJ⊆I, and J′,J′′J',J''J′,J′′ proper subsets of JJJ with J′∪J′′≠∅J'\cup J''\ne\emptysetJ′∪J′′=∅. If

max⁡ν∈J∖J′, μ∈J∖J′′ν≠μ(dμ−rν)<P(J),\max_{\substack{\nu\in J\setminus J',\ \mu\in J\setminus J''\\ \nu\ne\mu}}\bigl(d_\mu-r_\nu\bigr)<P(J),ν∈J∖J′, μ∈J∖J′′ν=μ​max​(dμ​−rν​)<P(J),

then in every feasible schedule an activity from J′J'J′ starts first in JJJ or an activity from J′′J''J′′ ends last in JJJ.

The first infeasibility test (printed p. 169)

If some nonempty J⊆IJ\subseteq IJ⊆I has max⁡μ∈Jdμ−min⁡ν∈Jrν<P(J)\max_{\mu\in J}d_\mu-\min_{\nu\in J}r_\nu<P(J)maxμ∈J​dμ​−minν∈J​rν​<P(J), no feasible schedule exists.

The input test (3.123) and the output test (3.124) (printed p. 171)

For Ω⊆I\Omega\subseteq IΩ⊆I nonempty and i∈I∖Ωi\in I\setminus\Omegai∈I∖Ω: if max⁡μ∈Ω∪{i}dμ−min⁡ν∈Ωrν<P(Ω)+pi\max_{\mu\in\Omega\cup\{i\}}d_\mu-\min_{\nu\in\Omega}r_\nu<P(\Omega)+p_imaxμ∈Ω∪{i}​dμ​−minν∈Ω​rν​<P(Ω)+pi​ then i→ji\to ji→j for all j∈Ωj\in\Omegaj∈Ω; symmetrically, if max⁡μ∈Ωdμ−min⁡ν∈Ω∪{i}rν<P(Ω)+pi\max_{\mu\in\Omega}d_\mu-\min_{\nu\in\Omega\cup\{i\}}r_\nu<P(\Omega)+p_imaxμ∈Ω​dμ​−minν∈Ω∪{i}​rν​<P(Ω)+pi​ then j→ij\to ij→i for all j∈Ωj\in\Omegaj∈Ω.

The input-or-output test (printed p. 170)

For i,j∈J⊆Ii,j\in J\subseteq Ii,j∈J⊆I, ∣J∣≥2|J|\ge 2∣J∣≥2: if max⁡μ∈J∖{j}dμ−min⁡ν∈J∖{i}rν<P(J)\max_{\mu\in J\setminus\{j\}}d_\mu-\min_{\nu\in J\setminus\{i\}}r_\nu<P(J)maxμ∈J∖{j}​dμ​−minν∈J∖{i}​rν​<P(J) then iii starts first in JJJ or jjj ends last in JJJ, and i→ji\to ji→j when i≠ji\ne ji=j.

Theorem 3.8 (printed p. 186)

For a cumulative resource kkk, J⊆IkJ\subseteq I_kJ⊆Ik​ and proper subsets J′,J′′J',J''J′,J′′ of JJJ: if Rk(max⁡μ∈J∖J′′dμ−min⁡ν∈J∖J′rν)<W(J)R_k\bigl(\max_{\mu\in J\setminus J''}d_\mu-\min_{\nu\in J\setminus J'}r_\nu\bigr)<W(J)Rk​(maxμ∈J∖J′′​dμ​−minν∈J∖J′​rν​)<W(J) then an activity from J′J'J′ starts first in JJJ or an activity from J′′J''J′′ ends last in JJJ.

Significance

Theorem 3.7 is the single statement behind a whole toolbox. Every interval consistency test in the literature — the input and output tests that fix a new conjunction, the input-or-output test, the negation tests that only shrink a window — is the theorem with a particular choice of J′J'J′ and J′′J''J′′, and the book's Section 3.6.4 derives them one by one. A propagation engine that applies these tests to a fixpoint is what makes branch-and-bound for the job shop and the RCPSP practical; Carlier and Pinson's solution of the 10×10 job-shop instance is the historical demonstration. Theorem 3.8 extends the same reasoning from disjunctive to cumulative resources by replacing "no overlap" with "at most RkR_kRk​ units per time unit", the energetic-reasoning viewpoint that the rest of Section 3.6.5 develops.

The results are elementary and proved; formalizing them fixes, once, what "feasible" means in the presence of the relation sets CCC and DDD and time windows, on top of the RCPSP model of mission I. That layer is reusable: the start-start distance matrix of Section 3.6.2 and the symmetric-triple rules of Section 3.6.3 are statements about the same schedules and the same relations. Nothing here is on the platform or in Mathlib.

Difficulty

The obvious argument for Theorem 3.7 is the correct one, and its difficulty is in the bookkeeping. If no activity of J′J'J′ starts first and none of J′′J''J′′ ends last, the first starter is some ν∈J∖J′\nu\in J\setminus J'ν∈J∖J′ and the last finisher some μ∈J∖J′′\mu\in J\setminus J''μ∈J∖J′′, and every activity of JJJ is processed inside [Sν, Sμ+pμ]⊆[rν,dμ][S_\nu,\,S_\mu+p_\mu]\subseteq[r_\nu,d_\mu][Sν​,Sμ​+pμ​]⊆[rν​,dμ​]. Since the activities of a disjunctive set are pairwise non-overlapping, their total length P(J)P(J)P(J) fits in that interval, contradicting (3.121). The formal work is the packing lemma: pairwise disjoint integer intervals inside an interval of length LLL have total length at most LLL, which requires ordering the activities by start time and an induction that Mathlib does not supply.

The subtle point is the restriction ν≠μ\nu\ne\muν=μ in (3.121). The book allows it because "an activity which starts first cannot complete also last" when there are at least two activities with positive durations. The formal statement reads "starts first" and "ends last" with ≤\le≤, which makes the theorem true without a positivity hypothesis: when the restriction empties the index set, J∖J′=J∖J′′={x}J\setminus J'=J\setminus J''=\{x\}J∖J′=J∖J′′={x}, the conclusion holds because xxx cannot be both the unique first starter and the unique last finisher of a disjunctive set with two or more members. A solver should expect to handle that corner separately.

For the tests the extra step is turning "starts first" into a conjunction i→ji\to ji→j, which uses the disjunction between iii and jjj together with positive processing times: with pj=0p_j=0pj​=0 an activity could start at the same instant as iii without violating the disjunction, so the tests carry the positivity hypothesis that Theorem 3.7 itself does not need. Theorem 3.8 replaces the packing lemma by a work-counting lemma: over an interval of length LLL a resource of capacity RkR_kRk​ supplies at most RkLR_kLRk​L units, and every activity of JJJ consumes rikpir_{ik}p_irik​pi​ of them.

Formalization scope

Schedules are integer start-time vectors on Fin n, as in missions I and II, and a feasible schedule of this mission is one that is FeasibleSchedule for the RCPSP instance (mission I), respects the arcs of CCC (RespectsArcs, mission II), satisfies the disjunctions of DDD and lies within the time windows; these four hypotheses are the book's "feasible schedule" in Section 3.6 and are carried on every statement, although the arguments use only the last two, or, for Theorem 3.8, the resource constraint and the windows. The sets CCC and DDD are parameters, not derived from the instance, since propagation enlarges them.

Every inequality "max⁡(⋅)−min⁡(⋅)<P\max(\cdot)-\min(\cdot)<Pmax(⋅)−min(⋅)<P" is stated as the family of inequalities dμ<rν+Pd_\mu<r_\nu+Pdμ​<rν​+P over the same index pairs. This is equivalent, avoids natural-number subtraction, and gives an empty index set the value the convention max⁡∅=−∞\max\emptyset=-\inftymax∅=−∞ would: the hypothesis is then vacuous. "Starts first" and "ends last" use ≤\le≤. Proper-subset hypotheses J′⊂JJ'\subset JJ′⊂J, J′′⊂JJ''\subset JJ′′⊂J are the book's; the first infeasibility test needs JJJ nonempty, and the input-or-output test needs ∣J∣≥2|J|\ge 2∣J∣≥2.

A trivializing reading is ruled out on the disjunctive side by the nonemptiness hypotheses (an empty JJJ would make the infeasibility test's family vacuous and its conclusion false) and on the cumulative side by the observation that Theorem 3.8 with J′=J′′=∅J'=J''=\emptysetJ′=J′′=∅ asserts infeasibility, which is the book's intended reading. Welcome contributions beyond the milestones: the input-negation and output-negation tests, the window-tightening rules of Section 3.6.4, and the SSD-matrix results of Section 3.6.2.

Selected references

  • Peter Brucker and Sigrid Knust, Complex Scheduling, 2nd ed., Springer, 2012, Section 3.6. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-23929-8
  • Jacques Carlier and Eric Pinson, An algorithm for solving the job-shop problem, Management Science 35 (1989). doi:10.1287/mnsc.35.2.164
  • Philippe Baptiste, Claude Le Pape and Wim Nuijten, Constraint-Based Scheduling, Kluwer, 2001. doi:10.1007/978-1-4615-1479-4
  • Ulrich Dorndorf, Erwin Pesch and Toàn Phan-Huy, Constraint propagation techniques for the disjunctive scheduling problem, Artificial Intelligence 122 (2000). doi:10.1016/S0004-3702(00)00040-0
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CombinatoricsOperations Research·Captain: naimengye

Scheduling Algorithms V: Preemptive Scheduling on Uniform MachinesTextbook

Motivation

When several processors share a workload, the first question is how long the workload takes if it is spread out as well as possible. If a job may be interrupted and resumed later, possibly on another processor — preemption, the setting of operating systems, of communication links and of any resource that can be time-shared — the answer is a closed formula, and it is one of the oldest results in scheduling: McNaughton's wrap-around rule of 1959 (Scheduling with deadlines and loss functions, Management Science 6, doi:10.1287/mnsc.6.1.1) shows that on identical machines the optimal makespan is the larger of the longest job and the average load. Horvath, Lam and Sethi (A level algorithm for preemptive scheduling, Journal of the ACM 24, 1977, doi:10.1145/321992.321995) extended this to machines of different speeds, and Gonzalez and Sahni (Preemptive scheduling of uniform processor systems, Journal of the ACM 25, 1978, doi:10.1145/322047.322055) gave the fast algorithm with few preemptions. Brucker's Chapter 5 (doi:10.1007/978-3-540-69516-5) presents the level-algorithm version, and this mission formalizes the statements it proves about schedules.

Setting

There are nnn jobs with processing requirements p1,…,pn>0p_1,\dots,p_n>0p1​,…,pn​>0 and mmm uniform machines with speeds s1,…,sm>0s_1,\dots,s_m>0s1​,…,sm​>0: running job iii on machine jjj for a period of length ℓ\ellℓ performs sjℓs_j\ellsj​ℓ units of its requirement, so the whole job would take pi/sjp_i/s_jpi​/sj​ time units there. Identical machines are the case s1=⋯=sm=1s_1=\dots=s_m=1s1​=⋯=sm​=1.

A preemptive schedule is a finite list of pieces, each a job, a machine, a start time and a stop time. It is feasible for the data (s,p)(s,p)(s,p) when every piece lies in [0,∞)[0,\infty)[0,∞), no two pieces on the same machine overlap, no two pieces of the same job overlap (a job is on at most one machine at any instant), and every job iii receives total work exactly pip_ipi​ over its pieces. Its makespan Cmax⁡C_{\max}Cmax​ is the largest stop time; the completion time CiC_iCi​ of job iii is the largest stop time of one of its pieces. A schedule is nonpreemptive when every job consists of a single piece.

Following Section 5.1.2 the data are sorted, p1≥⋯≥pnp_1\ge\dots\ge p_np1​≥⋯≥pn​ and s1≥⋯≥sms_1\ge\dots\ge s_ms1​≥⋯≥sm​, with n≥mn\ge mn≥m, and one writes Pj=∑i≤jpiP_j=\sum_{i\le j}p_iPj​=∑i≤j​pi​, Sj=∑i≤jsiS_j=\sum_{i\le j}s_iSj​=∑i≤j​si​. For a set AAA of jobs, h(A)=S∣A∣h(A)=S_{|A|}h(A)=S∣A∣​ if ∣A∣≤m|A|\le m∣A∣≤m and h(A)=Smh(A)=S_mh(A)=Sm​ otherwise: the largest combined speed that ∣A∣|A|∣A∣ jobs can use at one instant.

Formalization targets

Goal — Theorem 5.8 (printed p. 127)

The optimal makespan of Q∣pmtn∣Cmax⁡Q\mid pmtn\mid C_{\max}Q∣pmtn∣Cmax​ is the bound (5.5):

w  =  max⁡{max⁡j=1m−1PjSj, PnSm},w \;=\; \max\Bigl\{\max_{j=1}^{m-1}\frac{P_j}{S_j},\ \frac{P_n}{S_m}\Bigr\} ,w=max{j=1maxm−1​Sj​Pj​​, Sm​Pn​​},

in the sense that some feasible preemptive schedule has makespan exactly www and no feasible preemptive schedule has a smaller makespan.

The lower bound (5.5) (printed p. 125)

Every feasible preemptive schedule has makespan at least www.

P∣pmtn∣Cmax⁡P\mid pmtn\mid C_{\max}P∣pmtn∣Cmax​ (printed p. 108)

On identical machines, LB=max⁡{max⁡ipi, 1m∑ipi}LB=\max\{\max_i p_i,\ \tfrac1m\sum_i p_i\}LB=max{maxi​pi​, m1​∑i​pi​} is a lower bound on the makespan and is attained by some feasible preemptive schedule.

Condition (5.8) (printed p. 129)

The jobs can be scheduled preemptively within [0,T][0,T][0,T] if and only if ∑i∈Api≤T h(A)\sum_{i\in A}p_i\le T\,h(A)∑i∈A​pi​≤Th(A) for every set AAA of jobs.

Theorem 5.7 (printed p. 121)

For P∣pmtn∣∑wiCiP\mid pmtn\mid\sum w_iC_iP∣pmtn∣∑wi​Ci​ with nonnegative weights there is an optimal schedule without preemption.

Significance

Theorem 5.8 turns an optimization over an infinite family of schedules into a formula in the data, and the formula is tight in both directions: each of its terms is a resource bound that some schedule meets exactly. That is what makes preemptive makespan minimization one of the few parallel-machine problems that is solvable at all — its nonpreemptive counterpart P2∥Cmax⁡P2\parallel C_{\max}P2∥Cmax​ is NP-hard (p. 124) — and it is why the preemptive relaxation appears as a bound inside branch-and-bound methods for the nonpreemptive problems.

Condition (5.8) is the form in which the result is reused. It is a Hall-type condition, one inequality per set of jobs, and it is exactly what Section 5.1.2 needs to prove Theorem 5.9, which decides Q∣pmtn;ri∣Lmax⁡Q\mid pmtn; r_i\mid L_{\max}Q∣pmtn;ri​∣Lmax​ by a maximum flow in an expanded network. Theorem 5.7 is the complementary statement for the other classical objective: for total weighted completion time preemption buys nothing, so the nonpreemptive solutions of Section 5.1.1 are optimal in the larger class too.

On status: every statement here is classical and proved, and the formalization adds a checked model of preemptive schedules. Mathlib has no scheduling material, and the platform's SchedulingAlgorithms series so far models only single-machine sequences (missions I, II, IV) and two-machine permutation flow shops (mission III), none of which allow a job to be split. The piece-list model of this mission is the first reusable object for preemptive and parallel-machine problems, and the later sections of Chapter 5 — Q∣pmtn;ri∣Lmax⁡Q\mid pmtn; r_i\mid L_{\max}Q∣pmtn;ri​∣Lmax​, P∣pmtn∣Lmax⁡P\mid pmtn\mid L_{\max}P∣pmtn∣Lmax​ — are stated in it.

Difficulty

The obvious first idea for the goal is to run McNaughton's rule with the speeds ignored. It fails on uniform machines: filling machines one after another does not respect the constraint that a long job on a slow machine is not done when a short job on a fast one is. The correct idea is the level algorithm — always process the jobs of highest remaining requirement on the fastest free machines, sharing machines among tied jobs — and the difficulty is in the analysis rather than the idea. The proof of Theorem 5.8 has to show that the schedule it produces ends exactly at one of the terms of www: either no machine idles before the end, giving Pn/SmP_n/S_mPn​/Sm​, or the machines finish in speed order with the first jjj jobs busy from time 000, giving Pj/SjP_j/S_jPj​/Sj​. Making that case analysis rigorous requires tracking that the order of remaining requirements is preserved over time (the invariant (5.6)) and that ties are broken consistently.

A second, formal difficulty is that the level algorithm's output is defined by continuous-time events (the next completion, the next time two levels coincide), so producing an explicit finite list of pieces with the required properties is itself a construction. Any proof must build a concrete schedule; "the infimum of makespans equals www" is not the goal.

For the lower bound the trap is the opposite: it is tempting to argue only with total capacity SmTS_mTSm​T, which gives Pn/SmP_n/S_mPn​/Sm​ but not Pj/SjP_j/S_jPj​/Sj​. The latter needs the rule that a job is on at most one machine at a time, so that jjj jobs run at combined speed at most SjS_jSj​; a model that let a job be split across machines simultaneously would make the theorem false, and the definition of feasibility rules it out explicitly.

Formalization scope

A schedule is a List of Pieces over jobs Fin n and machines Fin m, with real start and stop times. Feasibility is the three-part condition of the Setting, disjointness of two pieces meaning one stops no later than the other starts. Work is measured with the machine's speed, so the same definitions cover identical machines as the constant speed 111. Pieces of length zero and unsorted lists are allowed; both are harmless.

The sorted orders are hypotheses Antitone p and Antitone s, the speeds and requirements are positive, m≥1m\ge 1m≥1 and, where the book assumes it, n≥mn\ge mn≥m. The book's normalization s1=1s_1=1s1​=1 is not assumed: every statement here is invariant under scaling all speeds, and the book uses the normalization only for a running-time estimate. The bound www is defined as the maximum of an explicit nonempty finite set, so no supremum of an empty or unbounded set occurs; LBLBLB takes a proof that n≥1n\ge 1n≥1 so that max⁡ipi\max_i p_imaxi​pi​ is meaningful.

Two things are deliberately not stated. The level algorithm itself is not transcribed: Theorem 5.8 is stated as the existence of an optimal schedule of makespan www, which is what its proof establishes. And Theorem 5.9, the flow characterization for Q∣pmtn;ri∣Lmax⁡Q\mid pmtn; r_i\mid L_{\max}Q∣pmtn;ri​∣Lmax​, is left for a later mission, since it needs release times and the expanded network on top of this model.

A trivializing reading is excluded by the existential form of the goal and of Theorem 5.7: each asserts that an optimal schedule exists, not merely that any optimal schedule has a property. A proof of the goal has to construct a schedule; a proof of Theorem 5.7 has to construct a nonpreemptive one that beats every preemptive competitor. Contributions welcome beyond the milestones: a general lemma that a feasible schedule can be normalized to sorted, positive-length pieces, and a proof that (5.8) for the sets {1,…,j}\{1,\dots,j\}{1,…,j} is equivalent to w≤Tw\le Tw≤T.

Selected references

  • Peter Brucker, Scheduling Algorithms, 5th ed., Springer, 2007, Chapter 5. doi:10.1007/978-3-540-69516-5
  • Robert McNaughton, Scheduling with deadlines and loss functions, Management Science 6 (1959). doi:10.1287/mnsc.6.1.1
  • E. C. Horvath, S. Lam and R. Sethi, A level algorithm for preemptive scheduling, Journal of the ACM 24 (1977). doi:10.1145/321992.321995
  • Teofilo Gonzalez and Sartaj Sahni, Preemptive scheduling of uniform processor systems, Journal of the ACM 25 (1978). doi:10.1145/322047.322055
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Information TheoryTheoretical Computer Science·Captain: Lucas

Shannon 1949: Perfect SecrecyResearch Paper

Motivation

Cryptography before 1949 was a catalogue of ciphers and of the tricks that broke them. C. E. Shannon's Communication Theory of Secrecy Systems (Bell System Technical Journal 28(4):656–715, 1949) replaced the catalogue with a probabilistic model: a cipher is a family of invertible maps from messages to cryptograms, indexed by a key drawn from a known distribution, and the cryptanalyst's state of knowledge after an interception is the a posteriori distribution over messages. Part II of that paper asks when interception conveys nothing at all. The answer — perfect secrecy — is the origin of the one-time pad's security proof and of the modern habit of defining security as the indistinguishability of a posteriori from a priori beliefs.

This mission formalizes §10, Perfect Secrecy: the definition, the necessary and sufficient condition (Shannon's Theorem 6), the counting bound that the key set be at least as large as the message set, the cyclic system that attains the bound, the Latin-square description of the systems that attain it, and the entropy form of the constraint.

Setting

A finite secrecy system consists of three finite sets — the messages MMM, the keys KKK, the cryptograms EEE — together with an enciphering map Tk:M→ET_k : M \to ETk​:M→E for each key kkk. Each TkT_kTk​ is non-singular, i.e. injective, so a receiver who knows the key deciphers unambiguously. The key is drawn from an a priori distribution P(k)≥0P(k) \ge 0P(k)≥0, ∑kP(k)=1\sum_k P(k) = 1∑k​P(k)=1, and the message from an a priori distribution P(M)≥0P(M) \ge 0P(M)≥0, ∑MP(M)=1\sum_M P(M) = 1∑M​P(M)=1, independently of the key.

Three derived quantities carry the theory. The key weight

PM(E)  =  ∑k : TkM=EP(k)P_M(E) \;=\; \sum_{k \,:\, T_k M = E} P(k)PM​(E)=k:Tk​M=E∑​P(k)

is the probability that the cryptogram is EEE given that the message is MMM. The cryptogram probability is P(E)=∑MP(M)PM(E)P(E) = \sum_M P(M) P_M(E)P(E)=∑M​P(M)PM​(E), the probability of obtaining EEE from any cause. The a posteriori probability of the message after interception is PE(M)=P(M)PM(E)/P(E)P_E(M) = P(M) P_M(E) / P(E)PE​(M)=P(M)PM​(E)/P(E), defined for cryptograms with P(E)≠0P(E) \neq 0P(E)=0.

A system has perfect secrecy when, for every a priori message distribution and every cryptogram that can occur, PE(M)=P(M)P_E(M) = P(M)PE​(M)=P(M) for all MMM: interception leaves the cryptanalyst's probabilities unchanged. Quantifying over all a priori message distributions is Shannon's requirement that the equality hold "independently of the values of P(M)P(M)P(M)".

Finally, H(M)=−∑MP(M)log⁡P(M)H(M) = -\sum_M P(M)\log P(M)H(M)=−∑M​P(M)logP(M) and H(K)=−∑KP(K)log⁡P(K)H(K) = -\sum_K P(K)\log P(K)H(K)=−∑K​P(K)logP(K) are the entropies of the message and key choices.

Formalization targets

Goal — Theorem 6

perfect secrecy  ⟺  PM(E)=P(E)for all M,E.\text{perfect secrecy} \iff P_M(E) = P(E) \quad \text{for all } M, E .perfect secrecy⟺PM​(E)=P(E)for all M,E.

Equivalently, PM(E)P_M(E)PM​(E) does not depend on MMM: the total probability of the keys carrying MiM_iMi​ to a given EEE is the same as that of the keys carrying MjM_jMj​ to the same EEE. The goal fixes nothing about the sizes of the three sets, and no structure on the key distribution beyond normalization.

Milestone — the Bayes relation (p. 680)

P(E)=∑MP(M)PM(E),PE(M)=P(M)PM(E)P(E).P(E) = \sum_M P(M)P_M(E), \qquad P_E(M) = \frac{P(M)P_M(E)}{P(E)} .P(E)=M∑​P(M)PM​(E),PE​(M)=P(E)P(M)PM​(E)​.

Milestone — the key-counting bound (p. 681)

perfect secrecy  ⟹  #M≤#K.\text{perfect secrecy} \implies \#M \le \#K .perfect secrecy⟹#M≤#K.

Milestone — attainability, the cyclic system of Fig. 5 (p. 681)

TiMj=Es,s=i+j mod n,P(k)=1n  ⟹  perfect secrecy.T_i M_j = E_s, \quad s = i + j \bmod n, \quad P(k) = \tfrac1n \;\Longrightarrow\; \text{perfect secrecy}.Ti​Mj​=Es​,s=i+jmodn,P(k)=n1​⟹perfect secrecy.

Milestone — Latin-square characterization (p. 681)

perfect secrecy ∧ #M=#K=#E  ⟹  (∀M,E ∃!k, TkM=E) ∧ P is uniform.\text{perfect secrecy} \ \wedge\ \#M = \#K = \#E \implies \big(\forall M, E\ \exists! k,\ T_k M = E\big) \ \wedge\ P \text{ is uniform}.perfect secrecy ∧ #M=#K=#E⟹(∀M,E ∃!k, Tk​M=E) ∧ P is uniform.

Milestone — the entropy constraint (p. 682)

perfect secrecy  ⟹  H(M)≤H(K).\text{perfect secrecy} \implies H(M) \le H(K) .perfect secrecy⟹H(M)≤H(K).

Significance

Theorem 6 is the structural fact behind every later statement in the section: the counting bound, the Latin-square description, and the entropy constraint are all read off from the independence of PM(E)P_M(E)PM​(E) from MMM. The counting bound and the entropy constraint are the precise sense in which unconditional secrecy is expensive — the key must be at least as uncertain as the message — and they are the reason practical cryptography moved to computational assumptions. The cyclic system supplies the matching construction, so the bound is sharp.

These results are classical and have textbook proofs; what this mission produces is a machine-checked development of them from a single explicit model of a finite secrecy system, including the model itself. Mathlib has extensive measure-theoretic probability and some information theory, but no formalization of Shannon's secrecy systems, of perfect secrecy, or of the results of §10. The shared definition layer — ciphers with injective enciphering maps, key weights, a posteriori probabilities, the perfect-secrecy predicate, finite entropy — is reusable for the rest of the paper: the equivocation results of §11–§13, unicity distance, and the ideal-system theorems of §16 all rest on the same objects.

Difficulty

The two directions of Theorem 6 are not symmetric. Sufficiency is a computation. Necessity has to extract, from a statement about a posteriori probabilities that only constrains cryptograms of positive probability and only for one distribution at a time, a statement about key weights alone; the useful instantiation is a distribution giving every message positive mass, and the cryptograms of probability zero must be handled separately rather than ignored.

The counting and Latin-square milestones are finite combinatorics, but the obvious argument — "for each message and cryptogram pick the key joining them" — needs the keys picked to have positive probability, and the model permits keys of probability zero; this is exactly where an argument that looks complete on paper leaves a gap in Lean. The entropy milestone is the hardest of the five: H(M)≤H(K)H(M) \le H(K)H(M)≤H(K) passes through the conditional entropies H(M∣E)≤H(K∣E)H(M \mid E) \le H(K \mid E)H(M∣E)≤H(K∣E), and Mathlib's information-theoretic API is stated for measures rather than for finite weighted sums, so either a bridge or a self-contained development of finite conditional entropy is required.

Formalization scope

Messages, keys and cryptograms are arbitrary finite types with decidable equality on cryptograms; probabilities are real-valued functions with explicit non-negativity and normalization hypotheses rather than PMF, so that all sums are finite sums. A cipher bundles the enciphering maps, their injectivity, and the key distribution. The a posteriori probability is a real quotient, so it evaluates to zero when the cryptogram has probability zero; every statement that mentions it carries the hypothesis that the cryptogram has positive probability. Entropy uses the natural logarithm, with x↦−xln⁡xx \mapsto -x\ln xx↦−xlnx vanishing at 000; all inequalities are therefore in nats and are unaffected by the choice of base.

One trivializing formalization is ruled out explicitly: perfect secrecy is quantified over all a priori message distributions, not over one fixed distribution, and it is not vacuous — the cyclic milestone exhibits a family of ciphers satisfying it for every n≥1n \ge 1n≥1.

Contributions welcome beyond the milestones: finite conditional entropy and its chain rule as reusable lemmas, the equivalence of the present perfect-secrecy predicate with the statistical-independence formulation of message and cryptogram, and the extension of the model towards §11's equivocation HE(M)H_E(M)HE​(M), which is the next result of the paper to formalize.

Selected references

  • C. E. Shannon, Communication Theory of Secrecy Systems, Bell System Technical Journal 28(4):656–715, 1949. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1538-7305.1949.tb00928.x
  • C. E. Shannon, A Mathematical Theory of Communication, Bell System Technical Journal 27(3):379–423, 1948. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1538-7305.1948.tb01338.x
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Mathematical Physics·Captain: Lucas

Classical Dynamics I: Noether's TheoremTextbook

Motivation

Lagrangian mechanics is the standard reformulation of Newtonian dynamics used throughout physics: a mechanical system is described not by forces but by a single scalar function, the Lagrangian, and the equations of motion are the stationarity conditions of an integral of that function along a path. The organizing result of the theory is Noether's theorem: every continuous symmetry of the Lagrangian produces a quantity that is constant along every solution of the equations of motion. Conservation of momentum, of angular momentum, and of energy all arise this way, and the same statement — in field-theoretic form — underlies conservation laws in electrodynamics, general relativity, and the Standard Model.

This mission formalizes the Lagrangian chapter of David Tong's Classical Dynamics (University of Cambridge, Part II Mathematical Tripos), Section 2, in Lean 4. The finite-dimensional statement it targets is the one a physics student meets first, and it is the statement on which the field-theoretic versions are modelled.

Setting

The configuration space is Rn\mathbb{R}^nRn; a path is a map q:R→Rnq : \mathbb{R} \to \mathbb{R}^nq:R→Rn, written q(t)=(q1(t),…,qn(t))q(t) = (q_1(t), \dots, q_n(t))q(t)=(q1​(t),…,qn​(t)), and its velocity is the coordinatewise time derivative q˙i(t)\dot q_i(t)q˙​i​(t). A Lagrangian is a function

L:R×Rn×Rn→R,(t,q,v)↦L(t,q,v),L : \mathbb{R} \times \mathbb{R}^n \times \mathbb{R}^n \to \mathbb{R}, \qquad (t, q, v) \mapsto L(t, q, v),L:R×Rn×Rn→R,(t,q,v)↦L(t,q,v),

smooth in all arguments; Tong writes it L(qi,q˙i,t)L(q_i, \dot q_i, t)L(qi​,q˙​i​,t).

The action of a path over [t1,t2][t_1, t_2][t1​,t2​] is

S[q]=∫t1t2L(t,q(t),q˙(t)) dt.S[q] = \int_{t_1}^{t_2} L\big(t, q(t), \dot q(t)\big)\, dt .S[q]=∫t1​t2​​L(t,q(t),q˙​(t))dt.

A path is a motion (it solves Lagrange's equations, Tong eq. 2.43) when

ddt(∂L∂q˙i)=∂L∂qifor every i and every t,\frac{d}{dt}\left(\frac{\partial L}{\partial \dot q_i}\right) = \frac{\partial L}{\partial q_i} \qquad \text{for every } i \text{ and every } t,dtd​(∂q˙​i​∂L​)=∂qi​∂L​for every i and every t,

both partial derivatives being evaluated at (t,q(t),q˙(t))(t, q(t), \dot q(t))(t,q(t),q˙​(t)). The quantity pi=∂L/∂q˙ip_i = \partial L/\partial \dot q_ipi​=∂L/∂q˙​i​ is the generalised momentum conjugate to qiq_iqi​ (eq. 2.44), and

H=∑jq˙j∂L∂q˙j−LH = \sum_j \dot q_j \frac{\partial L}{\partial \dot q_j} - LH=j∑​q˙​j​∂q˙​j​∂L​−L

is the Hamiltonian (eq. 2.47). A function of time is a constant of the motion when it takes the same value at all times (eq. 2.46).

A one-parameter family of paths is a map Q:R×R→RnQ : \mathbb{R} \times \mathbb{R} \to \mathbb{R}^nQ:R×R→Rn, (s,t)↦Q(s,t)(s, t) \mapsto Q(s, t)(s,t)↦Q(s,t), whose s=0s = 0s=0 member Q(0,⋅)Q(0, \cdot)Q(0,⋅) is the path under study. It is a continuous symmetry of LLL (eq. 2.52) when

∂∂sL(t,Q(s,t),Q˙(s,t))=0for all s,t,\frac{\partial}{\partial s} L\big(t, Q(s,t), \dot Q(s,t)\big) = 0 \qquad \text{for all } s, t,∂s∂​L(t,Q(s,t),Q˙​(s,t))=0for all s,t,

the dot denoting ∂/∂t\partial/\partial t∂/∂t.

Formalization targets

Goal — Noether's theorem (Tong, eqs. 2.51–2.54)

If QQQ is a continuous symmetry of LLL and the path Q(0,⋅)Q(0, \cdot)Q(0,⋅) solves Lagrange's equations, then

N(t)=∑i=1n∂L∂q˙i(t,Q(0,t),Q˙(0,t)) ∂Qi∂s(0,t)N(t) = \sum_{i=1}^{n} \frac{\partial L}{\partial \dot q_i}\Big(t, Q(0,t), \dot Q(0,t)\Big)\, \frac{\partial Q_i}{\partial s}(0, t)N(t)=i=1∑n​∂q˙​i​∂L​(t,Q(0,t),Q˙​(0,t))∂s∂Qi​​(0,t)

takes the same value at every time ttt.

Supporting targets

(2.8)δS=0 for all fixed-endpoint variations  ⟺  ddt∂L∂q˙i=∂L∂qi\text{(2.8)} \quad \delta S = 0 \text{ for all fixed-endpoint variations} \iff \frac{d}{dt}\frac{\partial L}{\partial \dot q_i} = \frac{\partial L}{\partial q_i}(2.8)δS=0 for all fixed-endpoint variations⟺dtd​∂q˙​i​∂L​=∂qi​∂L​ (2.45)L and L+dfdt have the same equations of motion\text{(2.45)} \quad L \text{ and } L + \frac{df}{dt} \text{ have the same equations of motion}(2.45)L and L+dtdf​ have the same equations of motion (2.47)∂L∂t=0  ⟹  H is a constant of the motion\text{(2.47)} \quad \frac{\partial L}{\partial t} = 0 \implies H \text{ is a constant of the motion}(2.47)∂t∂L​=0⟹H is a constant of the motion (2.49)∂L∂qj≡0  ⟹  pj is a constant of the motion\text{(2.49)} \quad \frac{\partial L}{\partial q_j} \equiv 0 \implies p_j \text{ is a constant of the motion}(2.49)∂qj​∂L​≡0⟹pj​ is a constant of the motion

Significance

Noether's theorem is the statement that converts a structural property of a system — invariance under translations, rotations, or time shifts — into a number that does not change during the evolution. It is what licenses the use of conserved quantities as first integrals when solving mechanical problems, and it is the finite-dimensional prototype of the conservation laws that classify symmetries in field theory.

Formalizing it produces a small but reusable Lean development: a definition layer for Lagrangians and their partial derivatives on Rn\mathbb{R}^nRn, Lagrange's equations as a predicate on paths, the action functional, and the notion of a constant of the motion. Mathlib currently has the calculus these statements need — deriv, fderiv, ContDiff, interval integrals and differentiation under the integral sign — but no Lagrangian-mechanics layer built on top of it, so the definition layer of this mission is itself a contribution. The results here are classical and completely proved in the mathematical literature; what is missing is machine-checked proofs.

Difficulty

The physics derivations are three lines each, and all three lines are the ones that Lean does not grant for free. Tong's proof of Noether's theorem differentiates L(t,Q(s,t),Q˙(s,t))L(t, Q(s,t), \dot Q(s,t))L(t,Q(s,t),Q˙​(s,t)) with respect to sss by the chain rule, exchanges ∂s\partial_s∂s​ with ∂t\partial_t∂t​ on QQQ, and then substitutes Lagrange's equations; in Lean, each of these steps requires the corresponding differentiability side conditions to be produced from the smoothness hypotheses, and the exchange of the two partial derivatives requires a symmetry-of-second-derivatives argument. The principle-of-least-action target additionally needs differentiation under the integral sign and the fundamental lemma of the calculus of variations (a continuous function integrating to zero against every smooth bump supported in (t1,t2)(t_1, t_2)(t1​,t2​) vanishes there), neither of which is available in the exact shape needed.

The naive route — defining everything through fderiv on the product space and hoping simp unfolds the chain rule — does not close these goals, because the partial derivatives are taken in single coordinate slots and must be reassembled into a total derivative along the path.

Formalization scope

Conventions fixed by the Lean development and worth knowing before starting:

  • The configuration space is Fin n → ℝ for a fixed n : ℕ, and time is all of ℝ; no interval restriction is imposed except in the action functional.
  • Partial derivatives are one-dimensional derivs taken in a single slot, using Function.update to vary one coordinate. Where a derivative fails to exist, deriv returns 0; the smoothness hypotheses on L, on paths, and on families are stated so that this junk value is never the content of a statement.
  • Lagrange's equations are stated with HasDerivAt, so they assert the existence of d/dt (∂L/∂q̇ᵢ) as well as its value.
  • "Constant of the motion" is ∀ t₁ t₂, F t₁ = F t₂, i.e. constancy on all of ℝ, not merely a vanishing derivative.
  • The symmetry hypothesis is Tong's: the s-derivative vanishes for all s and t, not only at s = 0.
  • The degenerate case n = 0 is included in every statement; there it is trivially true. It is not, however, a trivializing formalization of any target: for n ≥ 1 the hypotheses are satisfied by standard systems (a free particle, a particle in a central potential), so none of the statements is vacuous.

Contributions welcome: proofs of any supporting target, reusable lemmas relating the coordinate-slot derivs used here to fderiv on the product space, and worked instances (translation invariance giving momentum conservation, rotational invariance giving angular momentum) built on the same definition layer.

Selected references

  • D. Tong, Classical Dynamics, University of Cambridge Part II Mathematical Tripos lecture notes, Michaelmas 2004/2005, Section 2. https://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/tong/dynamics.html
  • H. Goldstein, C. Poole, J. Safko, Classical Mechanics, 3rd ed., Addison-Wesley, 2001.
  • V. I. Arnold, Mathematical Methods of Classical Mechanics, 2nd ed., Springer, 1989.
  • E. Noether, Invariante Variationsprobleme, Nachr. d. König. Gesellsch. d. Wiss. zu Göttingen, Math-phys. Klasse (1918), 235–257.
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AnalysisHarmonic Analysis·Captain: Lucas

Analise de Fourier I: Parseval's Theorem for Fourier SeriesTextbook

Motivation

Periodic signals are the basic objects of audio processing, electrical engineering and the analytic study of partial differential equations, and the standard first-course tool for handling them is the Fourier series: a decomposition of a TTT-periodic signal into sinusoids of frequencies ωn=2πn/T\omega_n = 2\pi n / Tωn​=2πn/T. The identity that makes the decomposition quantitatively useful is Parseval's theorem: the average power of the signal equals the sum of the squared moduli of its Fourier coefficients, so energy can be accounted for frequency by frequency.

This mission formalizes the chain of results leading to that identity exactly as it is presented in the open-access undergraduate textbook Análise de Fourier — Um Livro Colaborativo (Esequia Sauter and Fabio Souto de Azevedo, orgs., UFRGS/REAMAT, 2022): the orthogonality relations of the trigonometric system (Teorema 3.2.1), the coefficient formulas (Teorema 3.2.2), the passage to the exponential form (§4.2), and the Parseval identity itself (Teorema 5.1.1).

Setting

Fix a period T>0T > 0T>0 and write

ωn  =  2πnT,n∈Z.\omega_n \;=\; \frac{2\pi n}{T}, \qquad n \in \mathbb{Z}.ωn​=T2πn​,n∈Z.

For a real-valued fff integrable on [0,T][0,T][0,T] the book defines the trigonometric Fourier coefficients (eq. 3.23)

an  =  2T∫0Tf(t)cos⁡(ωnt) dt,bn  =  2T∫0Tf(t)sin⁡(ωnt) dt,a_n \;=\; \frac{2}{T}\int_0^T f(t)\cos(\omega_n t)\,dt, \qquad b_n \;=\; \frac{2}{T}\int_0^T f(t)\sin(\omega_n t)\,dt,an​=T2​∫0T​f(t)cos(ωn​t)dt,bn​=T2​∫0T​f(t)sin(ωn​t)dt,

and for a complex-valued fff the exponential coefficients (§4.2, eq. 4.8)

Cn  =  1T∫0Tf(t) e−iωnt dt,n∈Z,C_n \;=\; \frac{1}{T}\int_0^T f(t)\,e^{-i\omega_n t}\,dt, \qquad n \in \mathbb{Z},Cn​=T1​∫0T​f(t)e−iωn​tdt,n∈Z,

which for real fff satisfy Cn=(an−ibn)/2C_n = (a_n - i b_n)/2Cn​=(an​−ibn​)/2. The average power of a TTT-periodic signal is (Definição 5.1.1)

Pf  =  1T∫0T∣f(t)∣2 dt.P_f \;=\; \frac{1}{T}\int_0^T |f(t)|^2\,dt .Pf​=T1​∫0T​∣f(t)∣2dt.

A trigonometric polynomial of degree NNN (Definição 3.2.1) is

a02+∑n=1N[ancos⁡(ωnt)+bnsin⁡(ωnt)].\frac{a_0}{2} + \sum_{n=1}^{N}\bigl[a_n\cos(\omega_n t) + b_n\sin(\omega_n t)\bigr].2a0​​+n=1∑N​[an​cos(ωn​t)+bn​sin(ωn​t)].

Formalization targets

Goal — Teorema 5.1.1 (Teorema de Parseval)

For T>0T > 0T>0 and f:R→Cf : \mathbb{R} \to \mathbb{C}f:R→C continuous and TTT-periodic,

1T∫0T∣f(t)∣2 dt  =  ∑n=−∞∞∣Cn∣2.\frac{1}{T}\int_0^T |f(t)|^2\,dt \;=\; \sum_{n=-\infty}^{\infty} |C_n|^2 .T1​∫0T​∣f(t)∣2dt=n=−∞∑∞​∣Cn​∣2.

The book states the identity for a periodic function "representable by a Fourier series"; the mission fixes continuity as the concrete sufficient regularity hypothesis, which keeps the statement non-vacuous and true, and leaves the sum as an unordered sum over Z\mathbb{Z}Z so that no summation order is smuggled in.

Supporting targets

  1. Teorema 3.2.1 — the three orthogonality relations of {cos⁡(ωnt),sin⁡(ωnt)}\{\cos(\omega_n t), \sin(\omega_n t)\}{cos(ωn​t),sin(ωn​t)} on [0,T][0,T][0,T], including the degenerate index n=m=0n = m = 0n=m=0.
  2. §4.2 — the orthogonality relation in exponential form, ∫0Teiωnte−iωmt dt=T\int_0^T e^{i\omega_n t}e^{-i\omega_m t}\,dt = T∫0T​eiωn​te−iωm​tdt=T for n=mn = mn=m and 000 otherwise, n,m∈Zn, m \in \mathbb{Z}n,m∈Z.
  3. Teorema 3.2.2 — recovery of the coefficients of a trigonometric polynomial by the integral formulas (3.23).
  4. Eq. (4.8) — Cn=(an−ibn)/2C_n = (a_n - i b_n)/2Cn​=(an​−ibn​)/2 for a real integrable fff.
  5. Bessel's inequality and summability — every finite partial sum of ∣Cn∣2|C_n|^2∣Cn​∣2 is at most PfP_fPf​, and the family (∣Cn∣2)n∈Z(|C_n|^2)_{n \in \mathbb{Z}}(∣Cn​∣2)n∈Z​ is summable. Summability is what gives the goal's infinite sum a meaning independent of any ordering.

Significance

Parseval's identity converts an integral estimate into a coefficientwise one: it is the bridge between the time domain and the frequency domain, underlies the RMS computations of the book's own electrical-engineering examples (Exemplo 5.1.2), and yields closed-form evaluations of numerical series (the book's Exemplo 5.1.3 computes a series of reciprocal odd squares this way).

Mathlib already contains the abstract Hilbert-space form of the identity for the Fourier basis on the circle AddCircle T. What this mission adds is the concrete, classroom-level layer that an engineering or physics reader recognizes: coefficients written as interval integrals of a function on R\mathbb{R}R with an explicit period TTT, the real (an,bn)(a_n, b_n)(an​,bn​) form, the exponential CnC_nCn​ form and the dictionary between them, and the orthogonality relations as free-standing computations. That layer is reusable by any later mission in this series (transformada de Fourier, equação do calor, equação da onda).

Difficulty

The obvious route — expand ∣f∣2=ffˉ|f|^2 = f\bar f∣f∣2=ffˉ​, substitute the Fourier series, and integrate term by term — is exactly the book's proof, and it is the step that a formal development cannot take for granted: interchanging the integral with an infinite sum requires a convergence theorem that the book explicitly places outside its scope (the remark after Definição 3.2.3), and pointwise convergence of the Fourier series of a merely continuous function is false in general. A complete proof must run through L2L^2L2 convergence rather than pointwise convergence, so the central task is to connect the interval-integral coefficients on [0,T][0,T][0,T] with the Hilbert-space machinery for the circle, including the change of variables and the normalization of Haar measure.

Formalization scope

The development commits to the following conventions, all fixed in the definition bundle so that every statement shares them:

  • The period is an explicit real parameter TTT with the hypothesis 0<T0 < T0<T written into each statement; at T=0T = 0T=0 the definitions would divide by zero and nothing is claimed.
  • Integrals are interval integrals over [0,T][0,T][0,T] of functions defined on all of R\mathbb{R}R; the book's alternative window [−T/2,T/2][-T/2, T/2][−T/2,T/2] is not used.
  • Coefficient indices range over Z\mathbb{Z}Z; ana_nan​ and bnb_nbn​ are defined for negative nnn as well, matching eq. (4.7) of the book.
  • an,bna_n, b_nan​,bn​ act on real-valued functions, CnC_nCn​ and the average power on complex-valued ones; a real signal enters the complex statements through the coercion of its values.
  • Sums over Z\mathbb{Z}Z are unordered sums, so the goal asserts convergence of the family, not of a symmetric partial-sum limit.
  • The sign convention is e−iωnte^{-i\omega_n t}e−iωn​t in the coefficient and e+iωnte^{+i\omega_n t}e+iωn​t in the synthesis, as in §4.2.

The goal is not trivializable: the hypotheses (a positive period, a continuous periodic function) are satisfiable, and both sides of the identity are non-degenerate already for f(t)=cos⁡(2πt/T)f(t) = \cos(2\pi t/T)f(t)=cos(2πt/T).

Useful infrastructure beyond the mission: the dictionary between the interval-integral coefficients on [0,T][0,T][0,T] and Mathlib's fourierCoeff on AddCircle T, and the orthogonality relations as standalone integral computations.

Selected references

  • Esequia Sauter, Fabio Souto de Azevedo (orgs.), Análise de Fourier — Um Livro Colaborativo, UFRGS/REAMAT, 26 July 2022. https://www.ufrgs.br/reamat/TransformadasIntegrais/livro-af/main.html
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Functional AnalysisMathematical Physics·Captain: Lucas

Density Functional Theory: The Hohenberg-Kohn TheoremsTextbook

Motivation

Density functional theory (DFT) is the computational method behind a large fraction of present-day electronic-structure calculations in condensed-matter physics, quantum chemistry and materials science. Its appeal is a drastic reduction in dimension: instead of an NNN-electron wavefunction Ψ(r1,…,rN)\Psi(r_1,\dots,r_N)Ψ(r1​,…,rN​) living on R3N\mathbb R^{3N}R3N, one works with the one-particle density ρ(r)\rho(r)ρ(r) on R3\mathbb R^{3}R3. That reduction is not a modelling approximation; it is licensed by two theorems of Hohenberg and Kohn (1964), for which Walter Kohn shared the 1998 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Every statement in this mission comes from the two Hohenberg–Kohn theorems and the identities the source text uses to set them up.

Timeline. The Thomas–Fermi model (1927) introduced density-only energy expressions but is known not to bind molecules (Teller, 1962). Hohenberg and Kohn (1964) proved that for non-degenerate ground states the external potential is fixed by the ground-state density, and that the exact energy functional is minimized at that density. Kohn and Sham (1965) turned this into a practical scheme by reproducing the density with non-interacting orbitals. Levy (1979) replaced the Hohenberg–Kohn functional, defined only on ground-state densities, by a constrained-search functional defined on all NNN-representable densities.

Setting

Fix an electron number. The objects are:

  • a set of admissible normalized wavefunctions Ψ\PsiΨ;
  • a set of external potentials vvv (in the physical model, multiplication by ∑iv(ri)\sum_i v(r_i)∑i​v(ri​));
  • a set of one-particle densities; the density of Ψ\PsiΨ is written ρΨ\rho_\PsiρΨ​.

Two functionals act on these. The universal part F(Ψ)F(\Psi)F(Ψ) is the expectation value of the kinetic-energy and electron–electron-interaction operators, which do not depend on the system. The external part is the expectation value of the external potential, and the identity that makes DFT possible is that it depends on Ψ\PsiΨ only through its density:

⟨Ψ∣∑iv(ri)∣Ψ⟩  =  ∫v(r) ρΨ(r) dr  =:  ext⁡(v,ρΨ).\langle \Psi \mid \textstyle\sum_i v(r_i) \mid \Psi\rangle \;=\; \int v(r)\,\rho_\Psi(r)\,dr \;=:\; \operatorname{ext}(v,\rho_\Psi).⟨Ψ∣∑i​v(ri​)∣Ψ⟩=∫v(r)ρΨ​(r)dr=:ext(v,ρΨ​).

The total energy is Ev(Ψ)=F(Ψ)+ext⁡(v,ρΨ)E_v(\Psi) = F(\Psi) + \operatorname{ext}(v,\rho_\Psi)Ev​(Ψ)=F(Ψ)+ext(v,ρΨ​). A state Ψ\PsiΨ is a ground state of vvv when it minimizes EvE_vEv​, and a nondegenerate ground state when it is the strict minimizer. A density is vvv-representable when it is the density of a nondegenerate ground state of some potential.

Formalization targets

Goal — the two Hohenberg–Kohn theorems

(1)∀ O, ∃ O: O(Ψ)=O(ρΨ)  for every nondegenerate ground state Ψ;\text{(1)}\quad \forall\,O,\ \exists\,\mathcal O:\ O(\Psi)=\mathcal O(\rho_\Psi) \ \text{ for every nondegenerate ground state } \Psi;(1)∀O, ∃O: O(Ψ)=O(ρΨ​)  for every nondegenerate ground state Ψ; (2)F[ρ0]+ext⁡(v,ρ0)  ≤  F[ρ]+ext⁡(v,ρ)for every v-representable ρ,\text{(2)}\quad F[\rho_0]+\operatorname{ext}(v,\rho_0)\;\le\;F[\rho]+\operatorname{ext}(v,\rho) \quad\text{for every } v\text{-representable } \rho,(2)F[ρ0​]+ext(v,ρ0​)≤F[ρ]+ext(v,ρ)for every v-representable ρ,

with equality exactly when ρ=ρ0\rho=\rho_0ρ=ρ0​, the ground-state density of vvv. Part (1) is the source's Corollary 1 — the density determines every ground-state property; part (2) is its Theorem 2.

Milestone level

The supporting statements are the density-determines-the-state half of Theorem 1, the potential-is-determined-up-to-a-constant half of Theorem 1, the well-definedness of the universal functional F[ρ]F[\rho]F[ρ], the variational principle, the Levy constrained-search identity, the identity ⟨Ψ∣∑iv(ri)∣Ψ⟩=∫vρΨ\langle\Psi|\sum_i v(r_i)|\Psi\rangle=\int v\rho_\Psi⟨Ψ∣∑i​v(ri​)∣Ψ⟩=∫vρΨ​ on L2(R3N)L^2(\mathbb R^{3N})L2(R3N), and the normalization ∫∑i∣φi∣2=N\int \sum_i |\varphi_i|^2 = N∫∑i​∣φi​∣2=N of a Kohn–Sham density built from orthonormal orbitals.

Significance

The Hohenberg–Kohn theorems are what justifies computing with ρ\rhoρ rather than Ψ\PsiΨ: without Theorem 1 the density would not carry enough information to determine the system, and without Theorem 2 there would be no variational principle to minimize. They are also the reason the exchange–correlation functional is a well-posed object of study: it is the unknown part of a functional that the theorems guarantee exists.

Formalizing them contributes a reusable variational core — ground states, universal functionals, vvv-representability, constrained search — plus two genuinely analytic statements about L2(R3N)L^2(\mathbb R^{3N})L2(R3N): the density-pairing identity for the external energy and the "a.e. nonvanishing eigenfunction forces the potential difference to be constant" lemma. The latter two are where the mathematical work lies, and both are stated here over the concrete configuration space (R3)N(\mathbb R^3)^N(R3)N, not in the abstract model.

Difficulty

The reductio that proves Theorem 1 is short, and it is short in Lean too. The difficulty of DFT as mathematics sits elsewhere, and this mission isolates it:

  • Going from "the two potentials share a ground state" to "they differ by a constant" requires knowing the ground state does not vanish on a set of positive measure — for Schrödinger operators this is unique continuation, and here it is placed in the hypotheses of the milestone that consumes it, not assumed away in the conclusion.
  • Turning ⟨Ψ∣∑iv(ri)∣Ψ⟩\langle\Psi|\sum_i v(r_i)|\Psi\rangle⟨Ψ∣∑i​v(ri​)∣Ψ⟩ into ∫vρΨ\int v \rho_\Psi∫vρΨ​ is a Fubini argument over (R3)N(\mathbb R^3)^{N}(R3)N with one coordinate singled out, and needs the measure-preserving identification of (R3)N(\mathbb R^3)^{N}(R3)N with R3×(R3)N−1\mathbb R^3\times(\mathbb R^3)^{N-1}R3×(R3)N−1 together with integrability bookkeeping.
  • The constrained-search identity is an interchange of two infima where the inner one is over a fibre that may be empty, so the junk value of sInf has to be handled.

Formalization scope

The variational layer is stated over an abstract model carrying the data actually used by the Hohenberg–Kohn argument: wavefunctions, potentials, densities, a universal functional FFF, a density map, and an external-energy pairing. No Hilbert-space structure is assumed there, because the argument uses none; what it uses is that FFF does not depend on vvv and that the external energy sees Ψ\PsiΨ only through ρΨ\rho_\PsiρΨ​. The two analytic milestones are stated concretely instead, on L2L^2L2 over (R3)N(\mathbb R^3)^{N}(R3)N, with ρΨ(r)=∑i∫∣Ψ(…,r,… )∣2\rho_\Psi(r)=\sum_i\int|\Psi(\dots,r,\dots)|^2ρΨ​(r)=∑i​∫∣Ψ(…,r,…)∣2.

Conventions fixed in Lean: energies are real; "nondegenerate ground state" means strict minimizer, so degenerate ground states are outside the scope of every statement that mentions it, exactly as in the source's caveat that the original theorems hold for non-degenerate ground states; vvv-representability quantifies over nondegenerate ground states only; the Hohenberg–Kohn functional takes the junk value 000 off the vvv-representable set, so statements about it always carry the representability hypothesis; the Levy functional is an sInf, which is 000 on an empty fibre.

The statements are not trivially satisfiable: the model has no hypothesis forcing the wavefunction set to be empty or the ground states to be unique, part (1) of the goal quantifies over every real-valued observable, and part (2) asserts an equality case, not merely an inequality. Contributions of the two analytic milestones are the most valuable: they need marginal-density machinery over product spaces that is reusable for any many-body formalization.

Selected references

  • P. Hohenberg, W. Kohn, Inhomogeneous electron gas, Phys. Rev. 136 (1964) B864. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRev.136.B864
  • W. Kohn, L. J. Sham, Self-consistent equations including exchange and correlation effects, Phys. Rev. 140 (1965) A1133. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRev.140.A1133
  • M. Levy, Universal variational functionals of electron densities, first-order density matrices, and natural spin-orbitals and solution of the v-representability problem, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 76 (1979) 6062. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.76.12.6062
  • E. H. Lieb, Density functionals for Coulomb systems, Int. J. Quantum Chem. 24 (1983) 243. https://doi.org/10.1002/qua.560240302
  • Wikipedia, Density functional theory. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Density_functional_theory
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Harmonic AnalysisNumerical Analysis·Captain: Lucas

Fast Fourier Transform I: Correctness of the Radix-2 Cooley–Tukey AlgorithmTextbook

Motivation

The discrete Fourier transform (DFT) is the basic spectral tool of digital signal processing, numerical analysis and computational number theory: it turns a finite sample of a signal into its frequency content, converts convolution into pointwise multiplication, and underlies fast integer and polynomial multiplication. Computed straight from its defining sum, a transform of length nnn costs Θ(n2)\Theta(n^2)Θ(n2) arithmetic operations. The fast Fourier transform (FFT) is any method that computes the same values in O(nlog⁡n)O(n \log n)O(nlogn) operations, and the radix-2 Cooley–Tukey algorithm is the most widely used of them.

The history is long and worth stating precisely. Gauss used an equivalent divide-and-conquer scheme in unpublished work of 1805 on the orbits of Pallas and Juno, without any complexity analysis. Danielson and Lanczos (1942) published the doubling step — the even/odd splitting identity that the recursion rests on — for x-ray crystallography. Good (1958) gave the prime-factor algorithm for coprime factorizations. Cooley and Tukey (1965) published the general composite-size algorithm together with the O(nlog⁡n)O(n \log n)O(nlogn) analysis that made the method famous. What is not known is a matching lower bound: whether a DFT of length nnn can be computed in o(nlog⁡n)o(n \log n)o(nlogn) arithmetic operations is open.

Setting

Fix a length n∈Nn \in \mathbb{N}n∈N and a sequence of complex samples x0,x1,x2,…x_0, x_1, x_2, \dotsx0​,x1​,x2​,…, modelled as a function x:N→Cx : \mathbb{N} \to \mathbb{C}x:N→C. The DFT of length nnn evaluated at frequency index kkk is

dft(n,x)(k)  =  ∑m=0n−1xm e−2πi mk/n,\mathrm{dft}(n, x)(k) \;=\; \sum_{m=0}^{n-1} x_m \, e^{-2\pi i\, m k / n},dft(n,x)(k)=m=0∑n−1​xm​e−2πimk/n,

and the inverse transform of a spectrum XXX is

idft(n,X)(m)  =  1n∑k=0n−1Xk e+2πi mk/n.\mathrm{idft}(n, X)(m) \;=\; \frac{1}{n} \sum_{k=0}^{n-1} X_k \, e^{+2\pi i\, m k / n}.idft(n,X)(m)=n1​k=0∑n−1​Xk​e+2πimk/n.

Only the first nnn samples x0,…,xn−1x_0, \dots, x_{n-1}x0​,…,xn−1​ enter the sum; the frequency index kkk is an arbitrary natural number, and the transform is nnn-periodic in it.

The radix-2 Cooley–Tukey algorithm is the recursion on the exponent ppp, with n=2pn = 2^pn=2p:

fft(0,x)(k)=x0,fft(p+1,x)(k)=E ⁣(k mod 2p)+e−2πik/2p+1⋅O ⁣(k mod 2p),\mathrm{fft}(0, x)(k) = x_0, \qquad \mathrm{fft}(p+1, x)(k) = E\!\left(k \bmod 2^p\right) + e^{-2\pi i k / 2^{p+1}} \cdot O\!\left(k \bmod 2^p\right),fft(0,x)(k)=x0​,fft(p+1,x)(k)=E(kmod2p)+e−2πik/2p+1⋅O(kmod2p),

where E=fft(p,m↦x2m)E = \mathrm{fft}(p, m \mapsto x_{2m})E=fft(p,m↦x2m​) is the transform of the even-indexed subsequence and O=fft(p,m↦x2m+1)O = \mathrm{fft}(p, m \mapsto x_{2m+1})O=fft(p,m↦x2m+1​) that of the odd-indexed one. The factor e−2πik/2p+1e^{-2\pi i k/2^{p+1}}e−2πik/2p+1 is the twiddle factor of the merge stage.

The arithmetic cost of that recursion is modelled by two counters. At the merge stage of a transform of 2p+12^{p+1}2p+1 points there are 2p2^p2p butterflies; each butterfly performs one twiddle-factor multiplication and two complex additions, and the two recursive calls are on 2p2^p2p points each:

M(0)=0,M(p+1)=2M(p)+2p,A(0)=0,A(p+1)=2A(p)+2p+1.M(0) = 0, \quad M(p+1) = 2M(p) + 2^p, \qquad A(0) = 0, \quad A(p+1) = 2A(p) + 2^{p+1}.M(0)=0,M(p+1)=2M(p)+2p,A(0)=0,A(p+1)=2A(p)+2p+1.

Formalization targets

Goal

∀ p∈N, ∀ x:N→C, ∀ k∈N:fft(p,x)(k)  =  dft(2p,x)(k).\forall\, p \in \mathbb{N},\ \forall\, x : \mathbb{N} \to \mathbb{C},\ \forall\, k \in \mathbb{N}: \quad \mathrm{fft}(p, x)(k) \;=\; \mathrm{dft}(2^p, x)(k).∀p∈N, ∀x:N→C, ∀k∈N:fft(p,x)(k)=dft(2p,x)(k).

The goal fixes no operation count and no rate: it asserts only that the recursion computes exactly the transform it is supposed to compute, at every frequency index, for every input. That is the statement an implementation's correctness rests on, and it stays true whatever the cost analysis of the algorithm turns out to be.

Supporting targets

The milestones are the intermediate statements the source separates out: nnn-periodicity of the transform in the frequency index; the Danielson–Lanczos even/odd splitting

dft(2N,x)(k)=dft(N,m↦x2m)(k)+e−2πik/(2N)⋅dft(N,m↦x2m+1)(k)(N≥1);\mathrm{dft}(2N, x)(k) = \mathrm{dft}(N, m \mapsto x_{2m})(k) + e^{-2\pi i k/(2N)} \cdot \mathrm{dft}(N, m \mapsto x_{2m+1})(k) \qquad (N \ge 1);dft(2N,x)(k)=dft(N,m↦x2m​)(k)+e−2πik/(2N)⋅dft(N,m↦x2m+1​)(k)(N≥1);

Fourier inversion idft(n,dft(n,x))(m)=xm\mathrm{idft}(n, \mathrm{dft}(n, x))(m) = x_midft(n,dft(n,x))(m)=xm​ for m<nm < nm<n; the conjugate symmetry Xn−k=Xk‾X_{n-k} = \overline{X_k}Xn−k​=Xk​​ of the spectrum of a real input; and the closed forms M(p)=n2log⁡2nM(p) = \tfrac{n}{2}\log_2 nM(p)=2n​log2​n and A(p)=nlog⁡2nA(p) = n\log_2 nA(p)=nlog2​n of the two cost recursions, with n=2pn = 2^pn=2p.

Significance

Fourier inversion and the splitting identity are the two facts that make the transform usable at all: the first says no information is lost, the second is the single algebraic step from which every Cooley–Tukey variant — mixed radix, split radix, iterative bit-reversed implementations — is assembled. The operation counts are what justify the claim that the algorithm is O(nlog⁡n)O(n\log n)O(nlogn) rather than Θ(n2)\Theta(n^2)Θ(n2): for n=220n = 2^{20}n=220 they are the difference between roughly 101210^{12}1012 and roughly 2×1072 \times 10^72×107 complex multiplications.

None of this is open mathematics; all of it is classical. What this mission produces is a self-contained machine-checked development of the radix-2 algorithm against an explicit definition of the DFT: a recursive algorithm, a proof that it agrees with the defining sum at every index, and a proof of its arithmetic cost. Mathlib carries Fourier theory for characters of finite abelian groups and for Z/nZ\mathbb{Z}/n\mathbb{Z}Z/nZ, but the mission is stated against the elementary sum above so that the statements can be read, and audited, without that background.

Difficulty

The obvious induction on ppp does not close by itself. Unfolding the recursion gives the even and odd sub-transforms evaluated at the reduced index k mod 2pk \bmod 2^pkmod2p, while the splitting identity produces them at kkk. Closing the gap needs periodicity of the length-NNN transform in its frequency index — which is why periodicity is a milestone rather than a step inside the main proof. The second recurring obstacle is bookkeeping with the exponential: e−2πi(2m)k/(2N)=e−2πimk/Ne^{-2\pi i (2m)k/(2N)} = e^{-2\pi i mk/N}e−2πi(2m)k/(2N)=e−2πimk/N and e−2πim=1e^{-2\pi i m} = 1e−2πim=1 are the only analytic inputs, but they must be applied under a finite sum with natural-number casts, where N\mathbb{N}N-subtraction and division by a cast nnn that may be zero are easy to get wrong.

Formalization scope

Sequences are total functions N→C\mathbb{N} \to \mathbb{C}N→C, not vectors of a fixed length: the length nnn appears only as the range of the defining sum, so the transform of length nnn ignores xmx_mxm​ for m≥nm \ge nm≥n. The frequency index ranges over all of N\mathbb{N}N, and the goal is asserted for every such index, not only for k<2pk < 2^pk<2p — the periodicity of both sides makes this the stronger, and cleaner, statement.

Degenerate inputs are inside the statements, not excluded by hypothesis. The length-000 transform is the empty sum 000; division by the cast (n:C)=0(n : \mathbb{C}) = 0(n:C)=0 follows Lean's convention z/0=0z/0 = 0z/0=0, which is why inversion carries the hypothesis 0<n0 < n0<n and the splitting identity carries 0<N0 < N0<N. The real-input symmetry is stated for k≤nk \le nk≤n, with N\mathbb{N}N-subtraction in n−kn - kn−k.

There is no trivializing reading: the FFT recursion is defined without ever mentioning the DFT, the cost counters are defined by their own recursions, and every hypothesis in the list above is satisfiable.

A complete development needs: the geometric-sum evaluation of ∑k<nζk\sum_{k<n} \zeta^k∑k<n​ζk for an nnn-th root of unity ζ≠1\zeta \ne 1ζ=1 (for inversion), the even/odd reindexing of a sum over {0,…,2N−1}\{0,\dots,2N-1\}{0,…,2N−1}, and the periodicity computations above. All of these are reusable beyond this mission; the splitting identity in particular is the entry point for a mixed-radix or split-radix sequel.

Selected references

  • J. W. Cooley and J. W. Tukey, An algorithm for the machine calculation of complex Fourier series, Mathematics of Computation 19 (1965), 297–301. https://doi.org/10.1090/S0025-5718-1965-0178586-1
  • G. C. Danielson and C. Lanczos, Some improvements in practical Fourier analysis and their application to x-ray scattering from liquids, Journal of the Franklin Institute 233 (1942), 365–380 and 435–452. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0016-0032(42)90767-1
  • M. T. Heideman, D. H. Johnson and C. S. Burrus, Gauss and the history of the fast Fourier transform, Archive for History of Exact Sciences 34 (1985), 265–277. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00348431
  • Fast Fourier transform, Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_Fourier_transform
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CombinatoricsMathematical Physics·Captain: Lucas

NRL Plasma Formulary I: Rothe–Hagen IdentityTextbook

Motivation

The NRL Plasma Formulary is a standard desk reference of the plasma-physics community: a compilation of the formulas, constants and unit conversions used in daily practice. Its opening section, "Numerical and Algebraic" (p. 3 of the 2013 edition), collects the few purely mathematical identities the rest of the handbook leans on. Two of them are exact summation formulas rather than approximations, and the first is the Rothe–Hagen identity, quoted there as valid "for all complex xxx, yyy, zzz except when singular" and attributed to H. W. Gould's work on binomial coefficient summations.

Unlike the handbook's numerical entries, this identity is a theorem with a precise hypothesis set, and it is exactly the kind of entry a reader takes on trust. It generalizes the Vandermonde convolution, it is the coefficient identity underlying the generalized binomial series, and it specializes to Abel's binomial theorem. Formalizing it turns one line of a reference handbook into a machine-checked statement and produces, as a by-product, a reusable Lean development of binomial coefficients with an arbitrary complex upper index.

Setting

For a complex number www and a natural number kkk, the generalized binomial coefficient is the falling factorial divided by a factorial,

(wk)  =  w(w−1)⋯(w−k+1)k!  =  1k!∏j=0k−1(w−j),\binom{w}{k} \;=\; \frac{w(w-1)\cdots(w-k+1)}{k!} \;=\; \frac{1}{k!}\prod_{j=0}^{k-1}(w-j),(kw​)=k!w(w−1)⋯(w−k+1)​=k!1​j=0∏k−1​(w−j),

with the empty-product convention (w0)=1\binom{w}{0} = 1(0w​)=1. It is a polynomial in www of degree kkk, and it agrees with the usual binomial coefficient when www is a natural number.

Fix complex parameters xxx, yyy, zzz and, for k∈Nk \in \mathbb{N}k∈N, consider the Rothe factor

Ak(x,z)  =  xx+kz(x+kzk),A_k(x,z) \;=\; \frac{x}{x+kz}\binom{x+kz}{k},Ak​(x,z)=x+kzx​(kx+kz​),

which is defined whenever x+kz≠0x + kz \neq 0x+kz=0. The factor x+kzx+kzx+kz in the denominator cancels against the leading factor of the falling factorial, so Ak(x,z)A_k(x,z)Ak​(x,z) extends to a polynomial in xxx and zzz: A0(x,z)=1A_0(x,z) = 1A0​(x,z)=1 and, for k≥1k \ge 1k≥1,

Ak(x,z)  =  x (x+kz−1)(x+kz−2)⋯(x+kz−k+1)k!.A_k(x,z) \;=\; \frac{x\,(x+kz-1)(x+kz-2)\cdots(x+kz-k+1)}{k!}.Ak​(x,z)=k!x(x+kz−1)(x+kz−2)⋯(x+kz−k+1)​.

Both forms occur in the literature; the mission carries both and asks for the comparison between them, because the quotient form is the one printed in the handbook while the polynomial form is the one that carries no side condition.

Formalization targets

Goal — the Rothe–Hagen identity, as printed

For complex x,y,zx,y,zx,y,z and n∈Nn \in \mathbb{N}n∈N, provided x+kz≠0x+kz \neq 0x+kz=0 and y+kz≠0y+kz \neq 0y+kz=0 for every 0≤k≤n0 \le k \le n0≤k≤n, and x+y+nz≠0x+y+nz \neq 0x+y+nz=0,

∑k=0nxx+kz(x+kzk)  yy+(n−k)z(y+(n−k)zn−k)  =  x+yx+y+nz(x+y+nzn).\sum_{k=0}^{n} \frac{x}{x+kz}\binom{x+kz}{k}\;\frac{y}{y+(n-k)z}\binom{y+(n-k)z}{n-k} \;=\; \frac{x+y}{x+y+nz}\binom{x+y+nz}{n}.k=0∑n​x+kzx​(kx+kz​)y+(n−k)zy​(n−ky+(n−k)z​)=x+y+nzx+y​(nx+y+nz​).

This is the handbook's line, with its "except when singular" proviso made explicit as the three non-vanishing hypotheses.

Stronger — the identity with no side condition

∑k=0nAk(x,z) An−k(y,z)  =  An(x+y,z),\sum_{k=0}^{n} A_k(x,z)\,A_{n-k}(y,z) \;=\; A_n(x+y,z),k=0∑n​Ak​(x,z)An−k​(y,z)=An​(x+y,z),

in terms of the polynomial form AkA_kAk​ above. This version holds for all complex x,y,zx,y,zx,y,z, with no exceptional locus, and implies the printed form wherever the latter's denominators are non-zero.

Supporting targets

(w+1k+1)=(wk)+(wk+1),∑k=0n(xk)(yn−k)=(x+yn).\binom{w+1}{k+1} = \binom{w}{k} + \binom{w}{k+1}, \qquad \sum_{k=0}^{n}\binom{x}{k}\binom{y}{n-k} = \binom{x+y}{n}.(k+1w+1​)=(kw​)+(k+1w​),k=0∑n​(kx​)(n−ky​)=(nx+y​).

The first is Pascal's rule for a complex upper index; the second is the Vandermonde convolution over C\mathbb{C}C, which is the case z=0z = 0z=0 of the goal.

Significance

The identity is the convolution law of the generalized binomial series: the formal power series Bz(t)\mathcal{B}_z(t)Bz​(t) solving B=1+t Bz\mathcal{B} = 1 + t\,\mathcal{B}^{z}B=1+tBz satisfies Bz(t)x=∑n≥0An(x,z) tn\mathcal{B}_z(t)^x = \sum_{n \ge 0} A_n(x,z)\,t^nBz​(t)x=∑n≥0​An​(x,z)tn, so the goal is the statement Bzx⋅Bzy=Bzx+y\mathcal{B}_z^x \cdot \mathcal{B}_z^y = \mathcal{B}_z^{x+y}Bzx​⋅Bzy​=Bzx+y​ read off coefficientwise (Graham–Knuth–Patashnik, Concrete Mathematics, §5.4). Consequences include Abel's binomial theorem, the Lagrange-inversion count of zzz-ary trees, and ballot-type identities in lattice-path enumeration.

Mathlib provides the Vandermonde convolution for natural-number arguments (Nat.add_choose_eq), the ascending and descending Pochhammer polynomials, and Ring.choose for binomial rings; it does not contain the Rothe–Hagen identity in any form. The four statements of this mission are therefore new formal content, and the complex-upper-index binomial API they force is reusable well beyond the mission.

The identity is classical and has been proved many times since Rothe (1793) and Hagen (1891), with the modern treatment in Gould's papers; nothing here is open mathematics. What is missing is a machine-checked proof.

Difficulty

The obvious attack — induction on nnn using Pascal's rule — does not close as stated: the summand Ak(x,z)A_k(x,z)Ak​(x,z) is not Pascal-stable, since shifting xxx by 111 moves x+kzx+kzx+kz for every kkk at once, and the induction hypothesis is about a different family. The standard proofs instead treat both sides as polynomials in xxx and yyy for fixed zzz and nnn, verify the identity on an infinite set of points where a combinatorial reading is available, and conclude by the identity theorem for polynomials; or they extract coefficients from the generalized binomial series via Lagrange inversion. Either route needs infrastructure: a two-variable polynomial-identity argument over C\mathbb{C}C, or a formal-power-series compositional inverse.

A second, more prosaic difficulty is the singular locus. The printed identity divides by x+kzx+kzx+kz for every k≤nk \le nk≤n, and in Lean division by zero returns zero rather than failing, so a formalization that drops the non-vanishing hypotheses states a different — and in general false — claim.

Formalization scope

All statements are over C\mathbb{C}C. The generalized binomial coefficient is defined as an explicit product over Finset.range k divided by (k ! : ℂ), so (w0)=1\binom{w}{0} = 1(0w​)=1 holds definitionally and no Nat.choose coercion enters. Sums run over Finset.range (n+1), with the complementary index written as the truncated natural subtraction n - k; inside that range this is the ordinary n−kn-kn−k, so the truncation convention is never exercised.

The proviso "except when singular" is formalized as three explicit hypotheses — x+kz≠0x+kz \ne 0x+kz=0 for all k≤nk \le nk≤n, y+kz≠0y+kz \ne 0y+kz=0 for all k≤nk \le nk≤n, and x+y+nz≠0x+y+nz \ne 0x+y+nz=0 — rather than by relying on Lean's junk value for division by zero. These hypotheses are satisfiable (for instance z=0z = 0z=0, x=y=1x = y = 1x=y=1), so the goal is not vacuous, and they constrain only denominators, so they do not trivialize the sum.

The singularity-free milestone commits to a total function rotheA defined by cases on kkk, with value 111 at k=0k = 0k=0; the comparison milestone pins that function to the quotient form under the non-vanishing hypothesis, so the mission cannot be satisfied by proving facts about a differently normalized object.

Contributions welcome beyond the milestones: complex-upper-index binomial API (symmetry, negation (−wk)=(−1)k(w+k−1k)\binom{-w}{k} = (-1)^k\binom{w+k-1}{k}(k−w​)=(−1)k(kw+k−1​), polynomiality in the upper index), and any formal-power-series development supporting Lagrange inversion.

Selected references

  • J. D. Huba, NRL Plasma Formulary, Naval Research Laboratory, 2013, p. 3, "Numerical and Algebraic" (Rothe–Hagen identity). https://www.nrl.navy.mil/News-Media/Publications/NRL-Plasma-Formulary/
  • H. W. Gould, "Note on Some Binomial Coefficient Identities of Rosenbaum", Journal of Mathematical Physics 10, 49 (1969). https://doi.org/10.1063/1.1664760
  • H. W. Gould and J. Kaucky, "Evaluation of a Class of Binomial Coefficient Summations", Journal of Combinatorial Theory 1, 233–247 (1966). https://doi.org/10.1016/S0021-9800(66)80051-9
  • R. L. Graham, D. E. Knuth, O. Patashnik, Concrete Mathematics, 2nd ed., Addison-Wesley, 1994, §5.4 (generalized binomial series).
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Group Theory·Captain: dbenbenn

Wolf: growth of finitely generated solvable groupsResearch Paper

Motivation

This mission formalizes the group theory of J. A. Wolf's Growth of finitely generated solvable groups and curvature of Riemannian manifolds, J. Differential Geometry 2 (1968) 421–446 (doi:10.4310/jdg/1214428658), namely its §3 and §4. Wolf opens with the object of study: "If a group Γ\GammaΓ is generated by a finite subset SSS, then one has the 'growth function' gSg_SgS​, where gS(m)g_S(m)gS​(m) is the number of distinct elements of Γ\GammaΓ expressible as words of length ≤m\le m≤m on SSS" (p. 421). Section 3 proves that a group with a finitely generated nilpotent subgroup of finite index "is of polynomial growth, and in fact c1mE1(Δ)≤gS(m)≤c2mE2(Δ)c_1m^{E_1(\Delta)} \le g_S(m) \le c_2m^{E_2(\Delta)}c1​mE1​(Δ)≤gS​(m)≤c2​mE2​(Δ)"; section 4 proves that "a polycyclic group, either has a finitely generated nilpotent subgroup of finite index and thus is of polynomial growth, or has no such subgroup and is of exponential growth" (p. 421).

Applying Milnor's companion note, which is the complete mission Milnor: growth of finitely generated solvable groups on this platform, Wolf concludes "that a finitely generated solvable group, either is polycyclic and has a nilpotent subgroup of finite index and is thus of polynomial growth, or has no nilpotent subgroup of finite index and is of exponential growth" (p. 421). That is the Milnor–Wolf theorem, the goal here, and Wolf's Theorem 4.8. It prompted the question Wolf asks on p. 422, "whether every finitely generated group Γ\GammaΓ, which is not of exponential growth, necessarily has a nilpotent subgroup of finite index"; Grigorchuk's groups of intermediate growth (1984) answered it in the negative, and Gromov (1981) proved that polynomial growth alone does force a nilpotent subgroup of finite index.

Setting

Growth. For a finite subset SSS of a group Γ\GammaΓ, the growth function gS(m)g_S(m)gS​(m) counts the elements expressible as words of length ≤m\le m≤m on SSS, a word s1a1⋯srars_1^{a_1} \cdots s_r^{a_r}s1a1​​⋯srar​​ having length ∣a1∣+⋯+∣ar∣|a_1| + \cdots + |a_r|∣a1​∣+⋯+∣ar​∣ (p. 426). The published MilnorWolf.growthFunction S m takes this as the size of the ball Chou.wordBall S m, the set of products of at most mmm factors from S∪S−1S \cup S^{-1}S∪S−1. Wolf's two kinds of bound (p. 421) are polynomial growth of degree ≤E\le E≤E, gS(m)≤c⋅mEg_S(m) \le c \cdot m^EgS​(m)≤c⋅mE, and exponential growth, u⋅vm≤gS(m)u \cdot v^m \le g_S(m)u⋅vm≤gS​(m) with v>1v > 1v>1; the published predicates are MilnorWolf.HasPolynomialGrowthOfDegreeLE and Chou.HasExponentialGrowth, the latter with u=1u = 1u=1, which is what Theorem 4.3 actually produces. Both quantify over some finite generating set, and Wolf shows (p. 427, p. 434) that neither depends on which one.

Growth exponents. For a finitely generated nilpotent Δ\DeltaΔ with lower central series Δ=Δ0⊇Δ1⊇⋯⊇Δs+1={1}\Delta = \Delta_0 \supseteq \Delta_1 \supseteq \cdots \supseteq \Delta_{s+1} = \{1\}Δ=Δ0​⊇Δ1​⊇⋯⊇Δs+1​={1}, each factor Δk/Δk+1\Delta_k/\Delta_{k+1}Δk​/Δk+1​ is finitely generated abelian with free part of rank nkn_knk​; Wolf's (3.3) sets E1(Δ)=∑k(k+1)nkE_1(\Delta) = \sum_k (k+1)n_kE1​(Δ)=∑k​(k+1)nk​ and E2(Δ)=∑k2knkE_2(\Delta) = \sum_k 2^kn_kE2​(Δ)=∑k​2knk​. These are MilnorWolf.growthExponentOne and MilnorWolf.growthExponentTwo.

Polycyclic groups. A solvable group is polycyclic if it satisfies condition (1) of Proposition 4.1: "There is a normal series Γ=A0⊃A1⊃⋯⊃At={1}\Gamma = A_0 \supset A_1 \supset \cdots \supset A_t = \{1\}Γ=A0​⊃A1​⊃⋯⊃At​={1} with every quotient Ai/Ai+1A_i/A_{i+1}Ai​/Ai+1​ finite or infinite cyclic" (p. 433), where a normal series, as in Kurosh, has each term normal in the preceding one. This is MilnorWolf.IsPolycyclic. Solvable is Mathlib's Group.IsSolvable.

Formalization targets

The goal is Wolf's Theorem 4.8 (p. 438): "Let Γ\GammaΓ be a finitely generated solvable group. If Γ\GammaΓ has a nilpotent subgroup Δ\DeltaΔ of finite index, then Γ\GammaΓ is polycyclic and of polynomial growth of degree ≤E2(Δ)\le E_2(\Delta)≤E2​(Δ). If Γ\GammaΓ does not have a nilpotent subgroup of finite index, then Γ\GammaΓ is of exponential growth."

The milestones are the results it rests on, in the paper's order. Section 3 climbs from two rescaling lemmas (3.4, 3.5) and the growth function of a free abelian group (3.6) through generating sets adapted to the lower central series (3.7) to the polynomial bounds for a finitely generated nilpotent group (3.2), then passes them to a group with a finite-index subgroup (3.11). Section 4 characterises polycyclic groups (4.1, whose one hard input is Hirsch's theorem, a milestone of its own) and proves the polycyclic dichotomy (4.3). Milnor's Theorem, already proved on this platform, appears as a reference milestone: it is what carries 4.3 from polycyclic to solvable, and Wolf notes on p. 437 that "J. Milnor extended the scope of Theorem 4.3 by proving [10] that a finitely generated nonpolycyclic solvable group must be of exponential growth."

Significance

Theorem 4.8 is the first growth dichotomy: within finitely generated solvable groups there is nothing between polynomial and exponential, and the polynomial side is exactly the almost nilpotent one. It is the result Gromov's theorem generalises in one direction and Grigorchuk's groups bound in the other, and the reason a group of intermediate growth can be neither solvable nor elementary amenable, which is how those groups were first placed outside both classes. Chou's Theorem 3.2, in the mission Chou: elementary amenable groups, extends exactly this statement to elementary amenable groups and cites both halves.

Section 3 also has independent value. The polynomial bounds with the explicit exponents E1E_1E1​ and E2E_2E2​ from the lower central series are sharper than the usual textbook statement that a finitely generated nilpotent group has polynomial growth, and the pieces along the way are reusable: the growth function of Zn\mathbb Z^nZn in closed form, and the fact that polynomial growth of a given degree is inherited from a finite-index subgroup.

Difficulty

The hard milestone is the second half of Theorem 4.3, that a polycyclic group with no nilpotent subgroup of finite index has exponential growth. Wolf proves it through Proposition 4.4, which passes to a Malcev completion and reads the eigenvalues of the induced Lie algebra automorphisms; that machinery is not in Mathlib and is not part of this mission. A route that avoids it: a polycyclic group acts on a free abelian factor of its chain by integer matrices, so either some element has an eigenvalue off the unit circle, and then the separation argument of Wolf's p. 437 applies verbatim with that factor in place of the Lie algebra, or every eigenvalue of every element lies on the unit circle, and then Kronecker's theorem, which Mathlib has, makes them all roots of unity, so a finite-index subgroup acts unipotently and is nilpotent. Wolf records in the "Added in Proof" (p. 445) that "B. Hartley recently sent me a manuscript consisting of an alternate proof that a polycyclic group without nilpotent subgroups of finite index is of exponential growth."

Theorem 3.2 is long rather than deep: the lower bound (3.8) and the upper bound (3.9), (3.10) are two inductions along the lower central series, each carrying explicit word-length bookkeeping, and both need the adapted generating sets of Lemma 3.7, in the corrected form stated here: as printed, the lemma fails when a lower-central factor has torsion. Mathlib has no polycyclic groups, so Proposition 4.1 starts from nothing; it also lacks Hirsch's theorem and P. Hall's finite presentability results, which is why Hirsch is stated here as its own milestone rather than assumed.

Formalization scope

No new definitions: every notion is taken from the published bundles Chou_Growth and MilnorWolf_Growth, so the statements here are directly comparable with those of the Chou and Milnor missions. Growth is measured on closed balls, Chou.wordBall S m being the products of at most mmm letters from S∪S−1S \cup S^{-1}S∪S−1 and gS(m)g_S(m)gS​(m) its cardinality, finite because SSS is a Finset. "Not of exponential growth" is the negation of an existential, so it is a statement about every finite generating set.

Conditions (8) to (11) of Proposition 4.1, Proposition 4.4 and the Lie-theoretic apparatus of §4, and the Riemannian geometry of §2, §5 and §6, are outside this mission; Proposition 4.1 is stated here with its first seven conditions, which are the ones §4 uses. Hirsch's theorem is cited, not proved, by Wolf, and appears as a milestone under its own source (Proc. London Math. Soc. 44 (1938) 53–60) rather than as an omission. Cheeger's and Hartley's sharpenings, recorded in Wolf's "Added in Proof", are not included.

No hypothesis is vacuous: the free abelian groups witness Proposition 3.6 and Theorem 3.2, a polycyclic group with no nilpotent subgroup of finite index exists (the semidirect product Z2⋊AZ\mathbb Z^2 \rtimes_A \mathbb ZZ2⋊A​Z for a hyperbolic A∈SL2(Z)A \in SL_2(\mathbb Z)A∈SL2​(Z), which is Wolf's own example of the exponential case), and the lamplighter group Z/2≀Z\mathbb Z/2 \wr \mathbb ZZ/2≀Z is finitely generated solvable and not polycyclic, so Theorem 4.8's second alternative is not empty either. Contributions welcome: proofs of any milestone, and the general library results they need, such as polycyclic groups and Hirsch's theorem.

Selected references

  • J. A. Wolf, Growth of finitely generated solvable groups and curvature of Riemannian manifolds, J. Differential Geometry 2 (1968), 421–446. doi:10.4310/jdg/1214428658
  • J. Milnor, Growth of finitely generated solvable groups, J. Differential Geometry 2 (1968), 447–449. doi:10.4310/jdg/1214428659
  • J. Milnor, Problem 5603, Amer. Math. Monthly 75 (1968), 685–686. The identifier is for the Advanced Problems section 5600–5609 that contains it: doi:10.2307/2313822
  • K. A. Hirsch, On infinite soluble groups. I, Proc. London Math. Soc. 44 (1938), 53–60. doi:10.1112/plms/s2-44.1.53
  • A. G. Kurosh, Theory of groups, vol. II, 2nd ed., translated by K. A. Hirsch, Chelsea, 1955. Scanned at archive.org/details/a.-g.-kurosh-the-theory-of-groups-volume-2-1960.
  • A. I. Mal'cev, On certain classes of infinite solvable groups, Amer. Math. Soc. Transl. (2) 2 (1956), 1–21. doi:10.1090/trans2/002/01
  • R. G. Swan, Representations of polycyclic groups, Proc. Amer. Math. Soc. 18 (1967), 573–574. doi:10.1090/S0002-9939-1967-0213442-5
  • M. Gromov, Groups of polynomial growth and expanding maps, Publ. Math. IHÉS 53 (1981), 53–78. doi:10.1007/BF02698687
  • R. I. Grigorchuk, Degrees of growth of finitely generated groups, and the theory of invariant means, Math. USSR-Izv. 25 (1985), 259–300 (Russian original 1984). doi:10.1070/IM1985v025n02ABEH001281
  • C. Chou, Elementary amenable groups, Illinois J. Math. 24 (1980), 396–407. doi:10.1215/ijm/1256047608
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Mathematical PhysicsPartial Differential Equations·Captain: Lucas

Schrödinger Equation I: Energy Quantization in the One-Dimensional Infinite Potential WellTextbook

Motivation

The Schrödinger equation is the equation of motion of non-relativistic quantum mechanics: it determines how the state of an isolated quantum system evolves in time. Its time-independent form is an eigenvalue equation whose eigenvalues are the energies the system can have. The single most elementary illustration that this eigenvalue problem forces energies to be discrete is the particle in a one-dimensional box, also called the infinite potential well: a particle of mass mmm confined to an interval [0,L][0, L][0,L] by walls of infinite potential energy. It is the first worked example in essentially every introduction to quantum mechanics, and it is the model in which "quantization" can be derived in a few lines from a boundary-value problem for an ordinary differential equation.

This mission is the first in a series formalizing the mathematical content of the Schrödinger equation. It targets exactly the particle-in-a-box computation: that the admissible energies are En=n2π2ℏ2/(2mL2)E_n = n^2 \pi^2 \hbar^2 / (2 m L^2)En​=n2π2ℏ2/(2mL2) for positive integers nnn, and nothing else.

Setting

Fix three positive real constants: the reduced Planck constant ℏ\hbarℏ, the mass mmm, and the width LLL of the box. A stationary state of energy E∈RE \in \mathbb{R}E∈R is a function ψ:R→C\psi : \mathbb{R} \to \mathbb{C}ψ:R→C such that

−ℏ22m ψ′′(x)  =  E ψ(x)for all x∈(0,L),-\frac{\hbar^2}{2m}\,\psi''(x) \;=\; E\,\psi(x) \qquad \text{for all } x \in (0, L),−2mℏ2​ψ′′(x)=Eψ(x)for all x∈(0,L),

together with the regularity needed to state it — ψ\psiψ is continuous on [0,L][0, L][0,L] and twice differentiable at every interior point — and the Dirichlet boundary conditions imposed by the infinite walls,

ψ(0)=0,ψ(L)=0.\psi(0) = 0, \qquad \psi(L) = 0 .ψ(0)=0,ψ(L)=0.

Inside the box the potential vanishes, which is why only the kinetic term appears; outside the box the potential is infinite and the wave function is identically zero, which is what forces the two boundary values. A stationary state is non-trivial if ψ(x)≠0\psi(x) \neq 0ψ(x)=0 for at least one x∈(0,L)x \in (0, L)x∈(0,L); the trivial solution ψ≡0\psi \equiv 0ψ≡0 is excluded because a physical state must be normalizable to unit probability.

Write En:=n2π2ℏ2/(2mL2)E_n := n^2 \pi^2 \hbar^2 / (2 m L^2)En​:=n2π2ℏ2/(2mL2) for n∈Nn \in \mathbb{N}n∈N, and ψn(x):=sin⁡(nπx/L)\psi_n(x) := \sin(n \pi x / L)ψn​(x):=sin(nπx/L) for the corresponding unnormalized eigenfunction.

Formalization targets

Goal — energy quantization

If ψ is a non-trivial stationary state of energy E, then ∃ n≥1 with E=n2π2ℏ22mL2.\text{If } \psi \text{ is a non-trivial stationary state of energy } E, \text{ then } \exists\, n \ge 1 \text{ with } E = \frac{n^2 \pi^2 \hbar^2}{2 m L^2}.If ψ is a non-trivial stationary state of energy E, then ∃n≥1 with E=2mL2n2π2ℏ2​.

This is the weakest statement that carries the physical content: it fixes no eigenfunction, no normalization and no phase, only the set of admissible energies.

Supporting targets

E≤0  ⟹  ψ≡0 on [0,L],E \le 0 \;\Longrightarrow\; \psi \equiv 0 \text{ on } [0, L],E≤0⟹ψ≡0 on [0,L], E>0  ⟹  ∃ C∈C,  ψ(x)=Csin⁡ ⁣(kx) on [0,L],k=2mEℏ,E > 0 \;\Longrightarrow\; \exists\, C \in \mathbb{C},\; \psi(x) = C \sin\!\big(k x\big) \text{ on } [0, L], \quad k = \frac{\sqrt{2 m E}}{\hbar},E>0⟹∃C∈C,ψ(x)=Csin(kx) on [0,L],k=ℏ2mE​​, k>0,  L>0,  sin⁡(kL)=0  ⟹  ∃ n≥1,  kL=nπ,k > 0,\; L > 0,\; \sin(kL) = 0 \;\Longrightarrow\; \exists\, n \ge 1,\; kL = n\pi,k>0,L>0,sin(kL)=0⟹∃n≥1,kL=nπ, ψn is a non-trivial stationary state of energy En(n≥1),\psi_n \text{ is a non-trivial stationary state of energy } E_n \quad (n \ge 1),ψn​ is a non-trivial stationary state of energy En​(n≥1), ∫0L∣ψn(x)∣2 dx=L2(n≥1).\int_0^L |\psi_n(x)|^2 \, dx = \frac{L}{2} \quad (n \ge 1).∫0L​∣ψn​(x)∣2dx=2L​(n≥1).

The last two give the converse direction — every EnE_nEn​ really occurs — and the normalization constant 2/L\sqrt{2/L}2/L​ that turns ψn\psi_nψn​ into a unit vector of L2([0,L])L^2([0,L])L2([0,L]).

Significance

The result itself is the standard textbook derivation: confinement plus the time-independent Schrödinger equation yields a discrete spectrum, with a strictly positive ground-state energy E1=π2ℏ2/(2mL2)E_1 = \pi^2\hbar^2/(2mL^2)E1​=π2ℏ2/(2mL2) (no state of zero energy exists) and level spacing growing like nnn. As a piece of mathematics it is the computation of the Dirichlet spectrum of the one-dimensional Laplacian on an interval, which is the model case for spectral theory on domains.

What the mission adds is a machine-checked version of both halves of that derivation, in a form that later missions in this series can import: a reusable predicate for "stationary state with Dirichlet boundary conditions", the classification of the solutions of ψ′′=−k2ψ\psi'' = -k^2\psiψ′′=−k2ψ with one boundary zero, and the quantization step. Mathlib contains the ordinary-differential-equation uniqueness results and the trigonometric API needed, but does not contain this boundary-value classification.

Difficulty

The physics derivation writes down the general solution ψ(x)=Aeikx+Be−ikx\psi(x) = A e^{ikx} + B e^{-ikx}ψ(x)=Aeikx+Be−ikx and is done. Formally, that step is the whole problem: one must prove that every twice-differentiable solution of ψ′′=−k2ψ\psi'' = -k^2 \psiψ′′=−k2ψ on an interval has this form, rather than assume it. The usual route is a uniqueness theorem for the associated first-order system applied to the difference of ψ\psiψ and an explicit sine solution, which requires converting the second-order scalar equation into a system and supplying a Lipschitz estimate. Two further traps: the sign case E≤0E \le 0E≤0 must be excluded separately (hyperbolic solutions with two zeros are identically zero), and the equation is assumed only on the open interval, so the values at the walls are reached by continuity rather than by evaluating the equation there.

Formalization scope

Wave functions are complex-valued functions of a real variable, ψ:R→C\psi : \mathbb{R} \to \mathbb{C}ψ:R→C; energies, ℏ\hbarℏ, mmm, LLL are real. Derivatives are the ordinary derivative of a complex-valued function of a real variable, the second derivative being the derivative of the derivative. The equation is imposed pointwise on the open interval (0,L)(0, L)(0,L) only, with continuity on the closed interval [0,L][0, L][0,L] and differentiability at interior points; nothing is assumed about ψ\psiψ outside [0,L][0, L][0,L], so the junk values of the derivative outside the box never enter a statement. The constants ℏ,m,L\hbar, m, Lℏ,m,L are hypothesized strictly positive, so no division by zero occurs in EnE_nEn​.

The goal is not vacuous: the supporting target exhibiting ψn\psi_nψn​ shows that its hypotheses are satisfiable for every n≥1n \ge 1n≥1, so the mission cannot be closed by proving that no non-trivial stationary state exists. Conversely the non-triviality hypothesis cannot be dropped: ψ≡0\psi \equiv 0ψ≡0 solves the boundary value problem for every real EEE.

Contributions welcome: the ODE classification lemma (solutions of ψ′′=−k2ψ\psi'' = -k^2\psiψ′′=−k2ψ on an interval), orthogonality of the ψn\psi_nψn​ in L2([0,L])L^2([0,L])L2([0,L]), and the finite-well and harmonic-oscillator analogues, which are planned as later missions in this series.

Selected references

  • Schrödinger equation, Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schr%C3%B6dinger_equation
  • Particle in a box, Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particle_in_a_box
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CombinatoricsMathematical Physics·Captain: Lucas

Nuclear Shell Model I: Harmonic-Oscillator Magic NumbersTextbook

Motivation

A nucleus whose proton number or neutron number equals one of 2,8,20,28,50,82,1262, 8, 20, 28, 50, 82, 1262,8,20,28,50,82,126 — the magic numbers — is markedly more tightly bound than the semi-empirical mass formula predicts, and markedly more stable against decay. The empirical evidence for closed nuclear shells at 505050 and 828282 protons and at 50,82,12650, 82, 12650,82,126 neutrons was assembled by Maria Goeppert Mayer in 1948 (Phys. Rev. 74, 235), and explained in 1949 by adding spin–orbit coupling to the shell picture (Phys. Rev. 75, 1969); the shell model that grew out of this work earned Goeppert Mayer and Hans Jensen a share of the 1963 Nobel Prize in Physics.

The textbook first step toward these numbers is purely combinatorial: approximate the nuclear force by an isotropic three-dimensional quantum harmonic oscillator, count the degenerate states at each energy level, double the count for spin, and accumulate. This mission formalizes exactly that step — including its well-known failure — from the Derivation section of the Wikipedia article Magic number (physics).

Setting

For the isotropic three-dimensional harmonic oscillator the energy depends only on the sum n=nx+ny+nzn = n_x + n_y + n_zn=nx​+ny​+nz​ of the three quantum numbers, so the states at level nnn are the triples of nonnegative integers summing to nnn — the weak 333-compositions of nnn. Write

Ln  =  {(nx,ny,nz)∈N3  :  nx+ny+nz=n}.L_n \;=\; \{(n_x,n_y,n_z)\in\mathbb{N}^3 \;:\; n_x+n_y+n_z=n\}.Ln​={(nx​,ny​,nz​)∈N3:nx​+ny​+nz​=n}.

Each state accommodates two nucleons of the same kind (two spin orientations), so the shell at level nnn holds

Cn  =  2 ∣Ln∣C_n \;=\; 2\,|L_n|Cn​=2∣Ln​∣

nucleons, and filling every shell of level below NNN takes

SN  =  ∑n<NCnS_N \;=\; \sum_{n<N} C_nSN​=n<N∑​Cn​

nucleons. A shell closure — hence a predicted magic number — is a value SNS_NSN​. Finally, M={2,8,20,28,50,82,126}M = \{2, 8, 20, 28, 50, 82, 126\}M={2,8,20,28,50,82,126} denotes the seven most widely recognized magic numbers.

Target

The mission's goal collects the content of the derivation:

∣Ln∣  =  (n+22),SN  =  2(N+23)  =  N(N+1)(N+2)3,|L_n| \;=\; \binom{n+2}{2}, \qquad S_N \;=\; 2\binom{N+2}{3} \;=\; \frac{N(N+1)(N+2)}{3},∣Ln​∣=(2n+2​),SN​=2(3N+2​)=3N(N+1)(N+2)​, (S1,S2,S3,S4)  =  (2, 8, 20, 40),(S_1,S_2,S_3,S_4) \;=\; (2,\,8,\,20,\,40),(S1​,S2​,S3​,S4​)=(2,8,20,40),

together with the comparison against MMM: the values 2,8,202, 8, 202,8,20 lie in MMM; the magic number 28∈M28 \in M28∈M is never of the form SNS_NSN​; and 40=S440 = S_440=S4​ is produced by the count although 40∉M40 \notin M40∈/M.

Significance

The positive half of the statement explains three of the seven magic numbers from nothing but degeneracy counting: 222, 888 and 202020 are exactly the first three oscillator shell closures. The negative half is the reason the shell model needs more physics: the oscillator count misses 282828 altogether and predicts 404040, which is not magic. Historically this gap is what spin–orbit coupling was introduced to close, and it is the precise sense in which "the correct formula for predicted magic numbers fundamentally relies on spin-orbit coupling".

As a formalization target the mission is small and self-contained: it fixes a reusable Lean model of oscillator shell filling (levels, degeneracies, spin doubling, cumulative capacity) and the stars-and-bars count behind it, against which later, more physical refinements — spin–orbit corrections, the empirical magic-number list — can be stated.

Difficulty

The mathematics is elementary; the work is in the counting and in the negative claims. The degeneracy ∣Ln∣=(n+22)|L_n| = \binom{n+2}{2}∣Ln​∣=(2n+2​) is stars and bars for three boxes, most directly obtained by fibering LnL_nLn​ over the first coordinate and summing ∑x≤n(n−x+1)\sum_{x\le n}(n-x+1)∑x≤n​(n−x+1). Asserting that no NNN gives SN=28S_N = 28SN​=28 is not a finite check: it needs the closed form together with monotonicity of N↦(N+23)N \mapsto \binom{N+2}{3}N↦(3N+2​) to rule out every NNN above the range where SNS_NSN​ is computed, since S3=20<28<40=S4S_3 = 20 < 28 < 40 = S_4S3​=20<28<40=S4​.

Formalization scope

Everything is over N\mathbb{N}N and finite. The level set LnL_nLn​ is a Finset (ℕ × ℕ × ℕ) cut out of the box [0,n]3[0,n]^3[0,n]3 by the equation nx+ny+nz=nn_x + n_y + n_z = nnx​+ny​+nz​=n, so its elements are ordered triples: permutations of the same multiset are distinct states, as the physics requires. Spin enters only as the literal factor 222 in CnC_nCn​, not as an extra coordinate. The cumulative count SNS_NSN​ runs over levels n<Nn < Nn<N, so S0=0S_0 = 0S0​=0 and S1=2S_1 = 2S1​=2; the NNN-th predicted magic number is SNS_NSN​, not SN−1S_{N-1}SN−1​. Binomial coefficients are Nat.choose, and the closed forms are stated in the division-free shape 2(N+23)2\binom{N+2}{3}2(3N+2​) to avoid truncated natural-number division. The set MMM of magic numbers is a hard-coded Finset ℕ transcribing the seven numbers listed by the source — it is a datum, not a derived object, and no claim in this mission asserts anything about nuclear stability itself.

The statements about 282828 and 404040 are what keep the mission from being a pure identity check: ∀N, SN≠28\forall N,\ S_N \neq 28∀N, SN​=28 quantifies over all NNN, and 40∉M40 \notin M40∈/M is a membership fact about the transcribed list.

Selected references

  • M. Goeppert Mayer, On Closed Shells in Nuclei, Physical Review 74 (1948) 235–239, doi:10.1103/PhysRev.74.235.
  • M. Goeppert Mayer, On Closed Shells in Nuclei. II, Physical Review 75 (1949) 1969–1970, doi:10.1103/PhysRev.75.1969.
  • Magic number (physics), Wikipedia, section Derivation, link.
  • N. J. A. Sloane (ed.), sequence A018226 (magic numbers of nucleons), The On-Line Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences.
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Convex Polytopes V.5: Effective enumeration of combinatorial typesTextbook

A convex polytope has both geometric coordinates and a finite pattern of faces. Moving its vertices can change distances and angles while preserving which vertices belong to which faces. Enumeration by combinatorial type asks for those incidence patterns, with geometrically different realizations of the same pattern counted together. Grünbaum’s enumeration theorem establishes that the complete collection can be determined algorithmically when the dimension and number of vertices are prescribed Convex Polytopes, §5.5, p.91.

A d-polytope here is a nonempty convex hull of finitely many points in real d-dimensional coordinate space, with affine span equal to the whole space. A face is obtained by maximizing a linear functional over the polytope; the collection of faces also includes the empty face and the polytope itself. Inclusion orders this collection. Two polytopes have the same combinatorial type when their full face collections admit an order isomorphism. This notion retains the incidence structure and forgets metric measurements.

To describe a type with finite data, label the k vertices by the integers from zero through k−1. Record the set of vertex labels belonging to each nonempty proper face. This family of subsets is the polytope’s scheme. A finite list of finite lists of natural numbers encodes such a family. The order of labels and repeated occurrences of a label do not change the represented subset. A scheme is realized only when its recorded subsets are exactly the vertex sets of the nonempty proper faces: it cannot add faces, omit faces, or introduce labels outside the prescribed range.

The target is a single total computable function

E:N×N⟶List⁡(List⁡(List⁡(N))).E : \mathbb N\times\mathbb N\longrightarrow \operatorname{List}(\operatorname{List}(\operatorname{List}(\mathbb N))).E:N×N⟶List(List(List(N))).

For every dimension d and vertex count k, each scheme in E(d,k) must have a realizing d-polytope with exactly k vertices. Every d-polytope with k vertices must realize some scheme in that output. Finally, if polytopes realizing two output positions have isomorphic full face posets, those positions must be equal. These requirements say that the output contains precisely one representative of every combinatorial type. The existential choice of one function precedes both numerical inputs, so the algorithm must work uniformly for all dimensions and vertex counts.

The result supplies an effective finite classification at each prescribed size. It is stronger than the observation that only finitely many incidence families can be written down: those families need not all arise from real convex polytopes. It also addresses termination, since a total algorithm must return its entire finite answer for every input. The theorem is a known mathematical result in the cited textbook. The present formal target asks for a proof of its stated algorithmic conclusion; no machine-checked proof of that conclusion is asserted here.

The principal difficulty is the connection between finite incidence data and geometric realizability. Combinatorial consistency alone does not supply real coordinates for a convex polytope. The source distinguishes this realizability question from the enumeration conclusion and identifies decidability over the real numbers as relevant to it §5.5, p.91. The mission retains the complete enumeration conclusion, including realizability of each answer, coverage of every type, and absence of duplicate types.

The formal representation uses real coordinates without a rationality restriction and permits nonsimplicial polytopes. Vertices are labelled injectively and exhaustively. The number of vertices is expressed as the number of nonempty zero-dimensional exposed faces. Nonemptiness separates the empty face, whose book dimension is −1, from the natural-valued dimension used to count faces. For finite convex hulls the face collections are finite, so this cardinality has its usual meaning.

Natural-number dimensions include dimension zero. The unique point has one vertex and no nonempty proper faces, and therefore uses an empty scheme. This is an explicit extension of the source’s positive-dimensional scheme convention. Unrealizable dimension and vertex-count pairs require an empty output. Finite-polytope faces, their ordered collection, vertex counts, and finite scheme realizations are the concrete objects needed to state the goal; total computability applies to the complete finite output rather than to individual tests alone.

Reference: Branko Grünbaum, Convex Polytopes, second edition, Springer, 2003, §5.5, Theorem 2 (5.5.2), printed p.91, PDF p.117; definitions in §§2.4 and 3.1. Source text.

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Convex Polytopes IV: Facet growth of binary polytopes (GRU-M04-BINARY-EXTREMA)Textbook

Binary choices and polyhedral complexity

A vector whose coordinates are all zero or one records a collection of yes-or-no choices. Taking the convex hull of a collection of these vectors gives a 0/1-polytope, also called a binary polytope. Such objects connect discrete choices with geometry: points describe feasible combinations, while supporting inequalities describe restrictions that every feasible combination satisfies. Grünbaum's discussion in §4.9 emphasizes the role of facets of these polytopes in combinatorial optimization and cutting-plane descriptions.

The question here concerns how many facets can occur when the dimension grows. Restricting every generating point to binary coordinates gives a finite, highly structured collection of possible points. Nevertheless, this restriction still allows polytopes with very many distinct boundary faces. The theorem of Bárány and Pór establishes superexponential growth in the largest possible number of facets. The mission concerns the form of this growth asserted in Grünbaum's 2003 notes, printed page 69a, rather than a prescribed numerical constant.

Polytopes, dimension, and facets

Fix a natural number d. The ambient space is the real coordinate space R^d. A convex hull consists of all convex combinations of the generating points, meaning weighted averages with nonnegative weights whose sum is one. A polytope is the convex hull of a finite set of points. It is full-dimensional when its affine span is all of R^d; this rules out a polytope lying in a proper affine subspace.

For a binary polytope, every generating point belongs to {0,1}^d. A subset of this cube is automatically finite. Nonemptiness and full dimension are imposed separately in the target. Consequently, the dimension in the facet bound is the actual dimension of the polytope as well as the dimension of its coordinate space.

An exposed face is the set of all points of the polytope that maximize a given linear functional. A facet is a face of affine dimension d−1. Facets are counted as geometric sets. Two different inequalities that expose the same face do not contribute two facets. Write f_(d−1)(P) for this number.

The growth target

The target is the following existence statement:

∃c>1  ∃D∈N, D≥2,∀d≥D  ∃P⊆Rd,P is a full-dimensional binary polytope,fd−1(P)>cdln⁡d.\exists c>1\;\exists D\in\mathbb N,\ D\ge2,\quad \forall d\ge D\;\exists P\subseteq\mathbb R^d,\quad P\text{ is a full-dimensional binary polytope},\qquad f_{d-1}(P)>c^{d\ln d}.∃c>1∃D∈N, D≥2,∀d≥D∃P⊆Rd,P is a full-dimensional binary polytope,fd−1​(P)>cdlnd.

The constant c and threshold D are chosen before the dimension d. The polytope P may depend on d. The assertion therefore supplies a witness in every sufficiently large dimension. It does not merely assert the existence of one complicated polytope or of witnesses along an unspecified subsequence.

The logarithm is natural. Replacing it by another fixed base greater than one changes the admissible constant c, while preserving the shape of the theorem. The statement leaves both c and D unspecified. The Bárány–Pór paper, Theorem 1.1, supplies the asymptotic context for the book's formulation.

What superexponential growth says

For any fixed c greater than one, the expression c^(d ln d) eventually exceeds A^d for every fixed A greater than one. Thus a single exponential base cannot bound the facet counts of all binary polytopes across dimensions. The binary-coordinate restriction alone does not yield that kind of uniform bound.

The underlying mathematical result is established in the literature. The formalization task is to prove its stated existence conclusion with the precise geometric definitions above. The conclusion concerns actual facets of actual polytopes, so a family of redundant inequalities or a list with repetitions would not satisfy the counting requirement.

Why the existence statement is demanding

A large supply of binary points does not by itself identify the supporting hyperplanes of their convex hull. Counting points and counting facets are different tasks. Moreover, the theorem requires the same growth constant across all sufficiently large dimensions. Verifying individual examples, even examples with many facets, leaves that uniform asymptotic requirement unresolved.

The book describes certain random polytopes as witnesses. Its stated conclusion gives no probability distribution or numerical probability bound. The target records the resulting extremal existence assertion; it imposes no extra probabilistic hypothesis on the witness.

Geometric conventions

The coordinate model is Fin d → ℝ. IsDPolytope requires a nonempty finite convex hull with full affine span. IsZeroOnePolytope specifies the hull of binary-coordinate points. faceCount P k counts nonempty exposed faces with affine dimension k. These concrete notions also apply to other questions about finite-dimensional polytopes.

Face counts use natural cardinality. On the domain of finite polytopes there are only finitely many faces, so this is the ordinary finite count. Requiring D at least two ensures that d−1 represents the facet dimension without a low-dimensional subtraction convention and that the logarithm's argument is positive. Full dimension excludes the whole polytope from the facet count, and nonemptiness excludes the empty face.

Selected references

  • Branko Grünbaum, Convex Polytopes, second edition, Springer, 2003, §4.9, printed p.69a; definitions in §§2.4 and 3.1. Book.
  • Imre Bárány and Attila Pór, On 0-1 Polytopes with Many Facets, Advances in Mathematics 161 (2001), 209–228, Theorem 1.1. Paper.
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Convex Polytopes II: Finite convex representationsTextbook

Finite representations in convex geometry

A convex combination expresses a point as a weighted average of other points. Such representations connect geometric sets with finite lists of coordinates and coefficients. A point in a convex hull may initially be described using many generators, even when the ambient space has small dimension. Carathéodory's theorem gives a bound depending only on that dimension. Grünbaum presents this result as a basic theorem of convexity in Convex Polytopes, §2.3, Theorem 5, printed page 15 (the supplied source PDF, page 33).

Sets, points, and weights

Fix a natural number ddd. Real ddd-space consists of vectors with ddd real coordinates. Let AAA be any subset of this space. A convex combination of points of AAA is a finite sum of those points multiplied by nonnegative real coefficients, with the coefficients adding to one. The convex hull conv⁡A\operatorname{conv} AconvA is the set of all such combinations; equivalently, it is the smallest convex set containing AAA.

The generating set AAA can be finite or infinite. It need not be closed, bounded, or convex. Membership of a point xxx in its convex hull is the sole geometric assumption. The theorem concerns exact equality of vectors, so the representation is not an approximation or a limiting expression.

A dimension bound for every hull point

For every x∈conv⁡Ax\in\operatorname{conv} Ax∈convA, find points v0,…,vd∈Av_0,\ldots,v_d\in Av0​,…,vd​∈A and real numbers w0,…,wdw_0,\ldots,w_dw0​,…,wd​ satisfying

wi≥0(0≤i≤d),∑i=0dwi=1,x=∑i=0dwivi.w_i\geq 0\quad(0\leq i\leq d),\qquad \sum_{i=0}^{d}w_i=1,\qquad x=\sum_{i=0}^{d}w_i v_i.wi​≥0(0≤i≤d),i=0∑d​wi​=1,x=i=0∑d​wi​vi​.

This is the complete target of Theorem 2.3.5. The witnesses may depend on ddd, AAA, and xxx. No single selection of points must work for every point of the hull. Repeated points are permitted, and some coefficients may be zero. Thus the fixed list of d+1d+1d+1 positions can express a combination that uses fewer distinct points.

What the representation provides

The result gives a finite certificate for membership in a convex hull whose length is controlled by dimension rather than by the size of the generating set. In the plane it gives three positions, and in three-dimensional space it gives four. Infinite generating sets remain within the same statement: once a particular hull point is chosen, only finitely many generators are needed for its certificate.

The mission asks for a formal proof of this known mathematical result in its fixed-length formulation. Its content is the existence of points and normalized coefficients together. Supplying coefficients without ensuring that their points lie in AAA, or supplying a finite representation without the dimension bound, would leave part of the target unestablished.

The constraint that must be met

The definition of the convex hull guarantees a finite representation but does not directly fix its length at d+1d+1d+1. The dimension bound must hold while preserving nonnegativity, normalization, membership in the original generating set, and exact equality with the selected point. None of these constraints can be replaced by a condition on nearby points or on the closure of AAA.

Scope and boundary conventions

The coordinate model is Fin d → ℝ. Both the point list and the coefficient list are indexed by Fin (d + 1), corresponding to the source indices from zero through ddd. The convex hull, finite sums, and real scalar multiplication have their standard mathematical meanings. No additional geometric definition is needed.

Dimension zero has one position in the representation. If AAA is empty, its convex hull is empty, so there is no hull point to represent. A singleton generating set and sets contained in a proper affine subspace are allowed. Neither strict positivity of the weights nor affine independence of the selected points is required. The target does not assert uniqueness of a representation.

Selected reference

Branko Grünbaum, Convex Polytopes, second edition, Springer, 2003, Chapter 2, §2.3, Theorem 5, printed page 15; supplied source.pdf, page 33.

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Convex Polytopes V: Simplex sections through prescribed points (GRU-M05-PRESCRIBED-SECTIONS)Textbook

A polytope can be represented by cutting a higher-dimensional simplex with an affine flat. The geometry of the cut determines the resulting polytope. Perles's prescribed-point theorem adds a constraint to this representation: the cutting flat must pass through a point chosen in advance inside the simplex. Theorem 5.1.10 in Branko Grünbaum's Convex Polytopes, second edition (2003), shows that this requirement can always be met when the simplex has enough facets. The source is §5.1, printed page 74, with the section convention introduced on printed page 71.

A polytope is the convex hull of finitely many points. In this mission it is nonempty and full-dimensional in its ambient real coordinate space. Thus a d-polytope P in R^d contains enough points to span that space affinely. A face is the set of points on which a supporting linear functional attains its maximum; a facet is a face of dimension d−1. Different supporting functionals can describe the same face, so the facet allowance counts geometric faces rather than inequalities used to describe them.

A k-simplex is the convex hull of k+1 affinely independent points. Write its vertices as v₀,…,vₖ in R^k and its convex hull as T. Affine independence means there is no nontrivial affine relation among these vertices. The simplex therefore has dimension k, and its interior is taken in the whole space R^k. No restriction is placed on its side lengths or angles. A d-flat is a translate of a d-dimensional linear subspace. A section of T by such a flat L is the entire intersection T ∩ L.

The target is the following existence assertion. For every d-polytope P with at most k+1 facets, every k-simplex T in R^k, and every p in the interior of T, there is a d-flat L such that

p∈L,T∩L is affinely equivalent to P.p\in L,\qquad T\cap L\text{ is affinely equivalent to }P.p∈L,T∩L is affinely equivalent to P.

An affine equivalence here preserves affine combinations and is invertible on the affine spans. It can change lengths and angles. In the stated coordinates, it is represented by an injective real affine map A from R^d onto L satisfying

A(P)=T∩L.A(P)=T\cap L.A(P)=T∩L.

All input data, including the interior point p, are universally quantified before the flat and map are chosen. The flat can depend on these data. The source writes the facet allowance as f and the simplex dimension as f−1; the notation here uses f=k+1.

The prescribed-point conclusion gives control beyond the existence of some simplex section representing P. It permits the simplex and an interior point to be fixed while the cutting flat is selected to recover the given polytope. The conclusion concerns its full affine geometry: the image of every point of P lies in the section, and every point of the section belongs to that image. This is the additional representational constraint discussed immediately before Theorem 10 on printed page 74.

The difficulty lies in meeting these requirements simultaneously. A flat through the chosen point can have an intersection of the wrong affine shape. A section with the correct affine shape need not contain the prescribed point. The theorem requires both properties for every allowed simplex and point, while retaining the original facet bound. Neither a special regular simplex nor a selected interior point captures this quantifier structure.

The formal statement uses real coordinate spaces indexed by finite sets, finite convex hulls, affine spans, exposed faces, and affine maps. Nonempty faces are counted by their affine dimension. In dimension zero the facet allowance is automatic: under the convention counting the empty face it contributes at most one facet, which fits the allowance k+1. This avoids interpreting natural subtraction d−1 as a facet dimension at d=0. The zero-dimensional simplex and zero-dimensional polytope remain within the statement.

This is a known geometric theorem whose formal proof remains to be supplied. The target contains one proof placeholder. The definitions specify the underlying geometry concretely. The mission consists of the single prescribed-section theorem; its definitions support that statement, and no separate supporting theorem is included as a milestone. The source is Grünbaum, Convex Polytopes, second edition, Springer, 2003, §5.1, Theorem 10, printed page 74 (source.pdf page 100); see also §5.1, printed page 71 (PDF page 97), for the section convention.

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Grünbaum — Gale data and combinatorial type (5.4.5)Textbook

Gale data and combinatorial type

A convex polytope has geometric coordinates and a combinatorial structure: its faces, ordered by inclusion. Different coordinates can describe the same combinatorial type. Gale transforms connect these viewpoints by encoding affine dependencies among the vertices as another point configuration, often in a smaller-dimensional space.

Let P and Q be full-dimensional d-polytopes in real coordinate space, each with n vertices. Choose injective lists V and W containing all their vertices and fix a permutation θ of the n indices. The question is whether this prescribed vertex correspondence extends to an isomorphism between the full face posets of P and Q. The empty face and the whole polytope are included in these posets.

An affine dependency of V is a list of real coefficients a whose sum is zero and whose weighted sum of the vertices is zero. These coefficient lists form a vector space of dimension n−d−1. Choose any basis and put its vectors into the columns of a matrix. The n rows of this matrix form a Gale transform G of V. A Gale transform H of W is constructed in the same way, with its own choice of basis. The rows may repeat and may be zero; there is no general-position assumption.

Theorem 5.4.5 states that the prescribed correspondence extends to an isomorphism of face posets exactly when it preserves every relative-interior test on the Gale configurations. For every subset J of vertex indices, the origin belongs to the relative interior of the convex hull of the rows G(J) if and only if it belongs to the relative interior of the convex hull of H(θ(J)). Relative interior means interior within the affine span of the selected convex hull, not interior in the whole coordinate space.

The equivalence concerns every subset of indices and both directions of implication. It retains the prescribed permutation rather than merely asking whether the polytopes have some combinatorial equivalence. Indexing the Gale points also keeps track of which original vertices they represent when several Gale rows coincide. Taking a set image does not change the convex hull of a chosen subconfiguration.

The empty subset is included: its convex hull has empty relative interior, so both membership tests are false. For a simplex, n=d+1 and the Gale space has dimension zero. Its nonempty row subconfigurations consist of the zero vector, and the relative-interior formulation still applies. Zero-dimensional polytopes are also retained.

This mission is the equivalence criterion itself, with the concrete definitions of a full-dimensional polytope, its face poset, and a Gale transform. The grouping keeps transform construction within the vocabulary of the criterion. The neighboring results on affine and projective equivalence have different conclusions and are outside this goal.

Source: Branko Grünbaum, Convex Polytopes, second edition (2003), §5.4, Theorem 5, printed page 89 (PDF page 115). The affine-dependence construction appears on printed pages 85–86 (PDF pages 111–112).

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