List Of Conjectures By Paul Erdős
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The prolific
mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, mathematical structure, structure, space, Mathematica ...
Paul Erdős Paul Erdős ( ; 26March 191320September 1996) was a Hungarian mathematician. He was one of the most prolific mathematicians and producers of mathematical conjectures of the 20th century. pursued and proposed problems in discrete mathematics, g ...
and his various collaborators made many famous mathematical
conjecture In mathematics, a conjecture is a conclusion or a proposition that is proffered on a tentative basis without proof. Some conjectures, such as the Riemann hypothesis or Fermat's conjecture (now a theorem, proven in 1995 by Andrew Wiles), ha ...
s, over a wide field of subjects, and in many cases Erdős offered monetary rewards for solving them.


Unsolved

* The Erdős–Gyárfás conjecture on cycles with lengths equal to a power of two in graphs with minimum degree 3. * The Erdős–Hajnal conjecture that in a family of graphs defined by an excluded induced subgraph, every graph has either a large clique or a large independent set. * The Erdős–Mollin–Walsh conjecture on consecutive triples of powerful numbers. * The Erdős–Selfridge conjecture that a
covering system In mathematics, a covering system (also called a complete residue system) is a collection :\ of finitely many residue classes : a_i\pmod = \, whose union contains every integer. Examples and definitions The notion of covering system was i ...
with distinct moduli contains at least one even modulus. * The
Erdős–Straus conjecture The Erdős–Straus conjecture is an unproven statement in number theory. The conjecture is that, for every integer n that is greater than or equal to 2, there exist positive integers x, y, and z for which \frac=\frac+\frac+\frac. In other word ...
on the Diophantine equation 4/''n'' = 1/''x'' + 1/''y'' + 1/''z''. * The
Erdős conjecture on arithmetic progressions Erdős' conjecture on arithmetic progressions, often referred to as the Erdős–Turán conjecture, is a conjecture in arithmetic combinatorics (not to be confused with the Erdős–Turán conjecture on additive bases). It states that if the sum ...
in sequences with divergent sums of reciprocals. * The Erdős–Szekeres conjecture on the number of points needed to ensure that a point set contains a large convex polygon. * The
Erdős–Turán conjecture on additive bases The Erdős–Turán conjecture is an old unsolved problem in additive number theory (not to be confused with Erdős conjecture on arithmetic progressions) posed by Paul Erdős and Pál Turán in 1941. It concerns additive bases, subsets of natu ...
of natural numbers. * A conjecture on quickly growing integer sequences with rational reciprocal series. * A conjecture with Norman Oler on circle packing in an equilateral triangle with a number of circles one less than a
triangular number A triangular number or triangle number counts objects arranged in an equilateral triangle. Triangular numbers are a type of figurate number, other examples being square numbers and cube numbers. The th triangular number is the number of dots in ...
. * The minimum overlap problem to estimate the limit of ''M''(''n''). * A conjecture that the ternary expansion of 2^n contains at least one digit 2 for every n > 8. * The conjecture that the Erdős–Moser equation, , has no solutions except .


Solved

* The
Erdős–Faber–Lovász conjecture In graph theory, the Erdős–Faber–Lovász conjecture is a problem about graph coloring, named after Paul Erdős, Vance Faber, and László Lovász, who formulated it in 1972.. It says: :If complete graphs, each having exactly vertices, ha ...
on coloring unions of cliques, proved (for all large n) by Dong Yeap Kang, Tom Kelly,
Daniela Kühn Daniela Kühn (born 1973) is a German mathematician and the Mason Professor in Mathematics at the University of Birmingham in Birmingham, England.
, Abhishek Methuku, and Deryk Osthus. * The Erdős sumset conjecture on sets, proven by Joel Moreira, Florian Karl Richter, Donald Robertson in 2018. The proof has appeared in "
Annals of Mathematics The ''Annals of Mathematics'' is a mathematical journal published every two months by Princeton University and the Institute for Advanced Study. History The journal was established as ''The Analyst'' in 1874 and with Joel E. Hendricks as t ...
" in March 2019. * The Burr–Erdős conjecture on Ramsey numbers of graphs, proved by Choongbum Lee in 2015. * A conjecture on
equitable coloring In graph theory, an area of mathematics, an equitable coloring is an assignment of colors to the vertices of an undirected graph, in such a way that *No two adjacent vertices have the same color, and *The numbers of vertices in any two color class ...
s proven in 1970 by
András Hajnal András Hajnal (May 13, 1931 – July 30, 2016) was a professor of mathematics at Rutgers University and a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences known for his work in set theory and combinatorics. Biography Hajnal was born on 13 May 1931,< ...
and
Endre Szemerédi Endre Szemerédi (; born August 21, 1940) is a Hungarian-American mathematician and computer scientist, working in the field of combinatorics and theoretical computer science. He has been the State of New Jersey Professor of computer science a ...
and now known as the Hajnal–Szemerédi theorem. * A conjecture that would have strengthened the
Furstenberg–Sárközy theorem In mathematics, a square-difference-free set is a set of natural numbers, no two of which differ by a square number. Hillel Furstenberg and András Sárközy proved in the late 1970s the Furstenberg–Sárközy theorem of additive number theory ...
to state that the number of elements in a square-difference-free set of positive integers could only exceed the square root of its largest value by a polylogarithmic factor, disproved by András Sárközy in 1978. * The Erdős–Lovász conjecture on weak/strong delta-systems, proved by
Michel Deza Michel Marie Deza (27 April 1939. – 23 November 2016) was a Soviet and French mathematician, specializing in combinatorics, discrete geometry and graph theory. He was the retired director of research at the French National Centre for Scient ...
in 1974. * The
Erdős–Heilbronn conjecture In additive number theory and additive combinatorics, combinatorics, a restricted sumset has the form :S=\, where A_1,\ldots,A_n are finite empty set, nonempty subsets of a field (mathematics), field ''F'' and P(x_1,\ldots,x_n) is a polynomial ...
in combinatorial number theory on the number of sums of two sets of residues modulo a prime, proved by Dias da Silva and Hamidoune in 1994. * The Erdős–Graham conjecture in combinatorial number theory on monochromatic Egyptian fraction representations of unity, proved by Ernie Croot in 2000. * The Erdős–Stewart conjecture on the
Diophantine equation ''Diophantine'' means pertaining to the ancient Greek mathematician Diophantus. A number of concepts bear this name: *Diophantine approximation In number theory, the study of Diophantine approximation deals with the approximation of real n ...
''n''! + 1 = ''p''''k''''a'' ''p''''k''+1''b'', solved by Florian Luca in 2001. * The
Cameron–Erdős conjecture In combinatorics, the Cameron–Erdős conjecture (now a theorem) is the statement that the number of sum-free sets contained in = \ is O\big(\big). The sum of two odd numbers is even, so a set of odd numbers is always sum-free. There are \lce ...
on sum-free sets of integers, proved by Ben Green and Alexander Sapozhenko in 2003–2004. * The Erdős–Menger conjecture on disjoint paths in infinite graphs, proved by
Ron Aharoni Ron Aharoni (; born 1952) is an Israeli mathematician, working in finite and infinite combinatorics. Aharoni is a professor at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology, where he received his Ph.D. in mathematics in 1979. With Nash-William ...
and Eli Berger in 2009. * The
Erdős distinct distances problem In discrete geometry, the Erdős distinct distances problem states that every set of points in the plane has a nearly-linear number of distinct distances. It was posed by Paul Erdős in 1946 and almost proven by Larry Guth and Nets Katz in 2015. ...
. The correct exponent was proved in 2010 by
Larry Guth Lawrence David Guth (; born 1977) is a professor of mathematics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Education and career Guth graduated from Yale University in 2000 with a BS in mathematics. In 2005, he received his PhD in mathemati ...
and
Nets Katz Nets Hawk Katz is the W.L. Moody Professor of Mathematics at Rice University. He was a professor of mathematics at Indiana University Bloomington until March 2013 and the IBM Professor of Mathematics at the California Institute of Technology until ...
, but the correct power of log ''n'' is still undetermined. * The Erdős–Rankin conjecture on prime gaps, proved by
Ford Ford commonly refers to: * Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford * Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river Ford may also refer to: Ford Motor Company * Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company * Ford F ...
,
Green Green is the color between cyan and yellow on the visible spectrum. It is evoked by light which has a dominant wavelength of roughly 495570 nm. In subtractive color systems, used in painting and color printing, it is created by a com ...
, Konyagin, and
Tao The Tao or Dao is the natural way of the universe, primarily as conceived in East Asian philosophy and religion. This seeing of life cannot be grasped as a concept. Rather, it is seen through actual living experience of one's everyday being. T ...
in 2014. * The
Erdős discrepancy problem In mathematics, a sign sequence, or ±1–sequence or bipolar sequence, is a sequence of numbers, each of which is either 1 or −1. One example is the sequence (1, −1, 1, −1, ...). Such sequences are commonly studied in discrepancy theo ...
on partial sums of ±1-sequences.
Terence Tao Terence Chi-Shen Tao (; born 17 July 1975) is an Australian-American mathematician, Fields medalist, and professor of mathematics at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where he holds the James and Carol Collins Chair in the Co ...
announced a solution in September 2015; it was published in 2016. * The
Erdős squarefree conjecture In mathematics, a square-free integer (or squarefree integer) is an integer which is divisible by no square number other than 1. That is, its prime factorization has exactly one factor for each prime that appears in it. For example, is square-fr ...
that central binomial coefficients C(2''n'', ''n'') are never squarefree for ''n'' > 4 was proved in 1996. * The Erdős primitive set conjecture that the sum \sum_\frac for any primitive set A (a set where no member of the set divides another member) attains its maximum at the set of primes numbers, proved by Jared Duker Lichtman in 2022. * The Erdős-Sauer problem about maximum number of edges an n-vertex graph can have without containing a k-
regular Regular may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Music * "Regular" (Badfinger song) * Regular tunings of stringed instruments, tunings with equal intervals between the paired notes of successive open strings Other uses * Regular character, ...
subgraph, solved by Oliver Janzer and Benny Sudakov


See also

* List of things named after Paul Erdős


References


External links


Fan Chung, "Open problems of Paul Erdős in graph theory"

Fan Chung, living version of "Open problems of Paul Erdős in graph theory"
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Conjectures by Paul Erdos Erdos Paul Erdős Conjectures,Erdos