Is it possible for an irreducible polynomial with rational coefficients to have three zeros in an arithmetic progression? Assume that p(x) in Q[x] is irreducible of degree n >= 3.

Danika Mckay

Danika Mckay

Answered question

2022-10-28

Is it possible for an irreducible polynomial with rational coefficients to have three zeros in an arithmetic progression?
Assume that p ( x ) Q [ x ] is irreducible of degree n 3.
Is it possible that p(x) has three distinct zeros α 1 , α 2 , α 3 such that α 1 α 2 = α 2 α 3 ?
As also observed by Dietrich Burde a cubic won't work here, so we need deg p ( x ) 4. The argument goes as follows. If p ( x ) = x 3 + c 2 x 2 + c 1 x + c 0 , then c 2 = α 1 + α 2 + α 3 = 3 α 2 implying that α 2 would be rational and contradicting the irreducibility of p(x).
This came up when I was pondering this question. There the focus was in minimizing the extension degree [ Q ( α 1 α 2 ) : Q ]. I had the idea that I want to find a case, where α 1 α 2 is fixed by a large number of elements of the Galois group G = Gal ( L / Q ), L C the splitting field of p(x). One way of enabling that would be to have a lot of repetitions among the differences α i α j of the roots α 1 , , α n C of p(x). For the purposes of that question it turned out to be sufficient to be able to pair up the zeros of p(x) in such a way that the same difference is repeated for each pair (see my answer).
But can we build "chains of zeros" with constant interval, i.e. arithmetic progressions of zeros.
Variants:
- If it is possible for three zeros, what about longer arithmetic progressions?
- Does the scene change, if we replace Q with another field K of characteristic zero? (Artin-Schreier polynomials show that the assumption about the characteristic is relevant.)

Answer & Explanation

driogairea1

driogairea1

Beginner2022-10-29Added 16 answers

Step 1
The answer to your question is NO. Suppose by contradiction that such a polynomial P exists, and denote by S the set of roots. By hypothesis, some a S can be written a = b + c 2 where b,c are distinct elements of S. But since the Galois group acts transitively on S, this property holds for all a S. This motivates the following definition :
Definition. A (non-empty) set S C is AP-extensive if any a S can be written a = b + c 2 where b,c are distinct elements of S.
Note that an AP-extensive S R cannot have a largest element. In particular, any (non-empty) AP-extensive S R is necessarily infinite. This still holds in C :
Step 2
Lemma. If S C is AP-extensive, then S is infinite (or empty).
Proof of lemma. Suppose by contradiction that S is finite and nonempty. Then the set { b R   |   a , a + i b S } is finite also and therefore has a largest element b 0 . Let S 1 = { z S   |   I m ( z ) = b 0 }. It is easy to see that if a = b + c 2 with a , b , c S and further a S 1 , then b and c must be in S 1 also. So S 1 is AP-extensive as well. Next, let S 2 = S 1 i b 0 . Then S 2 is AP-extensive also, but by construction S 2 R . So S 2 (and hence S 1 , S also) must be infinite which is impossible. This concludes the proof.

Do you have a similar question?

Recalculate according to your conditions!

Ask your question.
Get an expert answer.

Let our experts help you. Answer in as fast as 15 minutes.

Didn't find what you were looking for?