Cokernels of random matrices satisfy the Cohen-Lenstra heuristics

Let A be an n by n random matrix with iid entries taken from the p-adic integers or Z/NZ. Then under mild non-degeneracy conditions the cokernel of A has a universal probability distribution. In particular, the p-part of an iid random matrix over the integers has cokernel distributed according to the Cohen-Lenstra measure up to an exponentially small error.Comment: 21 pages; submitte

Products of Differences over Arbitrary Finite Fields

There exists an absolute constant $\delta > 0$ such that for all $q$ and all subsets $A \subseteq \mathbb{F}_q$ of the finite field with $q$ elements, if $|A| > q^{2/3 - \delta}$, then $$|(A-A)(A-A)| = |\{ (a -b) (c-d) : a,b,c,d \in A\}| > \frac{q}{2}.$$ Any $\delta < 1/13,542$ suffices for sufficiently large $q$. This improves the condition $|A| > q^{2/3}$, due to Bennett, Hart, Iosevich, Pakianathan, and Rudnev, that is typical for such questions. Our proof is based on a qualitatively optimal characterisation of sets $A,X \subseteq \mathbb{F}_q$ for which the number of solutions to the equation $$(a_1-a_2) = x (a_3-a_4) \, , \; a_1,a_2, a_3, a_4 \in A, x \in X$$ is nearly maximum. A key ingredient is determining exact algebraic structure of sets $A, X$ for which $|A + XA|$ is nearly minimum, which refines a result of Bourgain and Glibichuk using work of Gill, Helfgott, and Tao. We also prove a stronger statement for $$(A-B)(C-D) = \{ (a -b) (c-d) : a \in A, b \in B, c \in C, d \in D\}$$ when $A,B,C,D$ are sets in a prime field, generalising a result of Roche-Newton, Rudnev, Shkredov, and the authors.Comment: 42 page

Note on the Theory of Correlation Functions

The purpose of this note is to improve the current theoretical results for the correlation functions of the Mobius sequence $\{\mu(n): n\geq 1 \}$ and the Liouville sequence $\{\lambda(n): n\geq 1 \}$.Comment: Sixty Six Pages. Keywords: Autocorrelation function, Correlation function, Multiplicative function, Liouville function, Mobius function, von Mangoldt function, Exponential Su

General Strong Polarization

Arikan's exciting discovery of polar codes has provided an altogether new way to efficiently achieve Shannon capacity. Given a (constant-sized) invertible matrix $M$, a family of polar codes can be associated with this matrix and its ability to approach capacity follows from the {\em polarization} of an associated $[0,1]$-bounded martingale, namely its convergence in the limit to either $0$ or $1$. Arikan showed polarization of the martingale associated with the matrix $G_2 = \left(\begin{matrix} 1& 0 1& 1\end{matrix}\right)$ to get capacity achieving codes. His analysis was later extended to all matrices $M$ that satisfy an obvious necessary condition for polarization. While Arikan's theorem does not guarantee that the codes achieve capacity at small blocklengths, it turns out that a "strong" analysis of the polarization of the underlying martingale would lead to such constructions. Indeed for the martingale associated with $G_2$ such a strong polarization was shown in two independent works ([Guruswami and Xia, IEEE IT '15] and [Hassani et al., IEEE IT '14]), resolving a major theoretical challenge of the efficient attainment of Shannon capacity. In this work we extend the result above to cover martingales associated with all matrices that satisfy the necessary condition for (weak) polarization. In addition to being vastly more general, our proofs of strong polarization are also simpler and modular. Specifically, our result shows strong polarization over all prime fields and leads to efficient capacity-achieving codes for arbitrary symmetric memoryless channels. We show how to use our analyses to achieve exponentially small error probabilities at lengths inverse polynomial in the gap to capacity. Indeed we show that we can essentially match any error probability with lengths that are only inverse polynomial in the gap to capacity.Comment: 73 pages, 2 figures. The final version appeared in JACM. This paper combines results presented in preliminary form at STOC 2018 and RANDOM 201

Moments and distribution of central L-values of quadratic twists of elliptic curves

We show that if one can compute a little more than a particular moment for some family of L-functions, then one has upper bounds of the conjectured order of magnitude for all smaller (positive, real) moments and a one-sided central limit theorem holds. We illustrate our method for the family of quadratic twists of an elliptic curve, obtaining sharp upper bounds for all moments below the first. We also establish a one sided central limit theorem supporting a conjecture of Keating and Snaith. Our work leads to a conjecture on the distribution of the order of the Tate-Shafarevich group for rank zero quadratic twists of an elliptic curve, and establishes the upper bound part of this conjecture (assuming the Birch-Swinnerton-Dyer conjecture).Comment: 28 page