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A Trilinear Maximal Function Estimate Via Arithmetic Combinatorics
A Trilinear Maximal Function Estimate Via Arithmetic Combinatorics
COMBINATORICS
1. Introduction
Define an interval to be any set of the form I = {x − N, . . . , x + N }, where x ∈ Z,
N ∈ Z+ . We refer to x = xI as the length of I and N = NI as the radius. One can think
of the space of intervals as a discrete half-space Z2+ ; it will be convenient to work on this
space instead of on the integers, and our notation for maximal functions etc. shall reflect
this perspective.
For any sets E, F , G of integers, consider the quantities
1
T (E, F, G)(I) := 2 |{(y, z) : y ∈ E ∩ I, z ∈ F ∩ I, y + z − xI ∈ G ∩ I}|
|I|
1
M (E)(I) := |E ∩ I|
|I|
and their associated maximal functions
T (E, F, G)(x) := sup T (E, F, G)(I); M (E)(x) := sup M (E)(x).
I:xI =x I:xI =x
for some absolute constant ε > 0 and all 0 < λ ≤ 1 (the claim is vacuously true for
λ > 1).
This claim will be superceded by a later paper in which we show that ε can be taken
arbitrarily close to 1/3 by using time-frequency analysis, similar to that used to prove
Carleson’s theorem. However, here we present a more elementary approach based on
arithmetic combinatorics.
and hence
∪
E−E ⊆ (2A−2A)∩(2B−2B) ⊆ (A+3T −3T )∩(B+3T ′ −3T ′ ) = (A+t)∩(B+t′ ).
t∈3T −3T,t′ ∈3T ′ −3T ′
Remark 2.5. It is quite likely that one can improve the bound (kk ′ )6 here substantially,
for instance by using the ideas from [3]. This would lead to an improvement of the final ε
in our bounds.
A related lemma is
Lemma 2.6. Let H be a finite non-empty subset of G, and let A, B be non-empty subsets
of H. Then
|A||B||H|
|(A − A) ∩ (B − B)| ≥ .
|H − A||H − B|
Proof Observe that ∑
χA+y ≥ |A|χH
y∈H−A
and ∑
χB+z ≥ |B|χH
z∈H−B
and hence on multplying
∑ ∑
χ(A+y)∩(B+z) ≥ |A||B|χH .
y∈H−A z∈H−B
Taking L1 norms of both sides and then using the pigeonhole principle, we can thus find
y, z such that
|A||B||H|
|(A + y) ∩ (B + z)| ≥ .
|H − A||H − B|
Now the claim follows since
((A + y) ∩ (B + z)) − ((A + y) ∩ (B + z)) ⊆ (A − A) ∩ (B − B).
Observe that
{x ∈ G : ME1 ,... ,EN f (x) ≥ λ} = {x ∈ G : x + En is heavy for some 1 ≤ n ≤ N }.
Now we use a Vitali covering argument to select a disjoint collection F of heavy sets, by
performing the following algorithm.
• Step 0. Initialize F to be the empty set, and n to be the integer N .
• Step 1. If there is a heavy set x + En for some x ∈ G which is disjoint from all
the sets in F, add it to F and then repeat Step 1. Otherwise, go to Step 2.
• Step 2. If n = 1, then we stop the algorithm. Otherwise, we replace n by n − 1
and return to Step 1.
It is clear that all the sets x + En that are placed in F by this algorithm are heavy and
disjoint. In particular we have
∑
λ|En | ≤ ∥f ∥l1 (G) , (4)
x+En ∈F
which ensures (since |En | ≥ 1 for all n) that F is finite, and the algorithm thus terminates
in finite time. Now suppose that x ∈ G is such that M f (x) ≥ λ. Then there exists
1 ≤ n ≤ N such that x + En is heavy. By construction, there must exist a heavy set
y + Em ∈ F with m ≥ n such that y + Em intersects x + En (otherwise x + En itself would
have been added to F at some stage, at which point one could take y + Em = x + En ).
In particular x ∈ y + Em − En ⊂ y + Em − Em . Thus we have
∪
{x ∈ G : ME1 ,... ,EN f (x) ≥ λ} ⊂ y + Em − Em .
y+Em ∈F
(since the interval [x − L, x + L] has to intersect E), while from Chebyshev’s inequality
we have
1 ∑
|{x : T (E, E, E)[x − L, x + L] > λ2 }| ≤ 2 T (E, E, E)[x − L, x + L]
λ x
1
≤ |{(x, y, z) : y, z, y + z − x ∈ E}|
λ2 L 2
|E|3
≤ .
λ2 L 2
Combining these two estimates, the result follows.
Now we prove (3). In light of (1), (2), it would suffice to show the “good-lambda”
inequality
|{x : T (E, E, E)(x) > λ2 and λ ≤ M (E)(x) ≤ λ1−ε }| ≤ Cλ−1+ε |E|. (5)
Observe that since E is finite, that there are only finitely many I which can be involved
in the above set.
To prove (5) we begin with the following observation.
Lemma 3.2. If I is an interval such that T (E, E, E)(I) > λ2 /2 and λ ≤ M (E)(x) ≤ λ1−ε
then there exists a non-empty set P ⊂ I which is Cλ−Cε -covering and such that
C −1 λ1+Cε |I| ≤ |P ∩ E| ≤ max(|E ∩ I|, |P |) ≤ Cλ1−Cε |I|.
Proof By hypothesis, we have
|{(y, z) : y, z, y + z − xI ∈ E ∩ I}| > λ2 |I|2 /2
and
|E ∩ I| ≤ λ1−ε |I|
and hence by (1)
λ|I| ≤ |E ∩ I| ≤ λ1−ε |I|. (6)
Thus if we let A := E ∩ I and G ⊂ A × A be the set of those pairs (y, z) for which
y + z − xI ∈ A, then
|G| ≥ λ2ε |A|2 /2
and
|{y + z : (y, z) ∈ G}| ≤ |A|.
By the Balog-Szemerédi-Gowers theorem (see [2, Proposition 12]) we can thus find a
non-empty subset A′ of A such that
|A′ | ≥ C −1 λCε |A|
and
C −1 λCε |A| ≤ |A′ − A′ | ≤ Cλ−Cε |A|
By Lemma 2.3, A′ − A′ is Cλ−Cε -covering. We now set P := A′ − A′ + a for some arbitrary
element a in A′ , then P is also Cλ−Cε -covering and has cardinality
C −1 λCε |A| ≤ |P | ≤ Cλ−Cε |A|
and since P contains A′ ,
|A ∩ P | ≥ |A′ | ≥ C −1 λCε |A|.
6 CIPRIAN DEMETER, TERENCE TAO, AND CHRISTOPH THIELE
In other words, with the convention that E0 := E, we have Ei = Ei−1 \Pi for all
1 ≤ i ≤ n − 1.
• (d) For all intervals I, we have T (En−1 , En−1 , En−1 )(I) < λ2 /2. More generally,
we have
T (Ei , Ei , Ei )(I) < λ2 /2 whenever |I| > |Ii+1 | (11)
(with the convention that |In | = 0).
Proof
We construct the triples (Ii , Pi , Ei ) by performing the following algorithm.
• (Step 0) Initialize n to equal 1.
• (Step 1) Locate an interval In such that T (En−1 , En−1 , En−1 )(In ) ≥ λ2 /2, and
such that the length |In | of the interval is maximal with respect to this property.
(Note that since E is finite, that there are only finitely many intervals In for
which T (En−1 , En−1 , En−1 )(In ) ≥ λ2 /2). If no such interval can be found, then we
terminate the algorithm. Otherwise, we move on to Step 2.
• (Step 2) Using Lemma 3.2, find a non-empty set Pn ⊂ In which is Cλ−Cε -covering
and such that
C −1 λ1+Cε |In | ≤ |Pn ∩ En−1 | ≤ max(|En−1 ∩ In |, |Pn |) ≤ Cλ1−Cε |In |. (12)
• (Step 3) We set En := En−1 \Pn , and then return to Step 1.
A TRILINEAR MAXIMAL FUNCTION 7
It is clear that this algorithm will ensure the properties (10), (9), (11). Since Pn ∩ En−1
is non-empty by construction, we see that En is strictly smaller than En−1 ; since E is
finite, we thus see that this algorithm terminates in finite time.
Since the quantities T (Ei , Ei , Ei )(I) are monotone decreasing in i, it is easy to verify
the nesting property (7) also. To prove (8), we observe from construction that the sets
Pi ∩ Ei−1 are disjoint subsets of E, thus
∑
n−1
|Pi ∩ Ei−1 | ≤ E,
i=1
for C chosen suitably large. Thus we may exclude this set from (5). In other words, if we
define a bad interval to be any I such that
∑n−1
T (E, E, E)(I) > λ ; 2
λ ≤ M (E)(xI ) ≤ λ 1−ε
; M( χ2Pi −Pi )(xI ) ≤ λ1−Cε
i=1
hence by (9)
|(Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I)| ≥ C −1 λ1+Cε |I|. (13)
Since Pi intersects I, we have
|(Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I)| ≤ |(2Pi − Pi ) ∩ (2I − I)|
and hence
M (χ2Pi −Pi )(2I − I) ≥ C −1 λ1+Cε .
On the other hand, since I is a bad interval, we have
∑
n−1
M (χ2Pi −Pi )(2I − I) ≤ Cλ1−Cε
i=1
and hence there are at most Cλ−Cε values of i for which Pi ∩ I is non-empty. By the
pigeonhole principle, we may therefore find 1 ≤ i ≤ i0 such that
T (Ei−1 , Ei−1 , Ei−1 )(I) − T (Ei , Ei , Ei )(I) ≥ C −1 λ2+Cε .
By (8), it thus suffices to show that
|{xI : I is a bad interval and T (Ei−1 , Ei−1 , Ei−1 )(I)−T (Ei , Ei , Ei )(I) ≥ C −1 λ2+Cε }| ≤ CλC0 ε |Ii |
for some large absolute constant C0 . Note that the trivial bound here is C|Ii | since xI
must lie in 2Ii − Ii . We can discard those intervals I for which |I| ≥ C −1 λ1/100 |Ii | since
those intervals can be dealt with by Lemma 3.1 (actually we can discard many more
intervals than this using dyadic decomposition).
We crudely estimate
T (Ei−1 , Ei−1 , Ei−1 )(I) − T (Ei , Ei , Ei )(I) ≤ T (Ei ∩ Pi , Ei , Ei )(I)
+ T (Ei , Ei ∩ Pi , Ei )(I)
+ T (Ei , Ei , Ei ∩ Pi )(I)
so at least one of these three terms has to be at least C −1 λ2+Cε . Let us say it is the first
term; the others are similar. Thus we need to show
|{xI : I is a bad interval and |I| ≤ C −1 λ1/100 |Ii | and T (Ei ∩ Pi , Ei , Ei )(I) ≥ C −1 λ2+Cε }| ≤ CλC0 ε |Ii |.
(14)
Let Imin be the interval of minimal length which contributes to the above set (which we
can of course assume is non-empty). Since Imin is a bad interval, we know that
|(Pi − Pi ) ∩ (Imin − Imin )| ≤ |(2Pi − Pi ) ∩ |2Imin − Imin |
= |2Imin − Imin |M (χ2Pi −Pi )(2Imin − Imin ) (15)
≤ Cλ1−Cε |Imin |.
This implies a certain “even spacing” property for Pi − Pi .
Lemma 3.4. There exists a set Xi of integers with cardinality
|Xi | ≤ Cλ−Cε (16)
such that for any integer x with |x| ≤ C −1 λ1/100 |Ii |, there exists a y ∈ Xi such that
|[x − y − 2|Imin |, x − y + 2|Imin |] ∩ (Pi − Pi )| ≥ C −1 λ1+Cε |Imin |.
A TRILINEAR MAXIMAL FUNCTION 9
The point is that the interval I has been replaced by an interval of a fixed size, so that
Lemma 3.1 is now applicable.
Proof Since T (Ei ∩ Pi , Ei , Ei )(I) ≥ C −1 λ2+Cε , we have
|{(y, z) : y ∈ Ei ∩ Pi ∩ I; z, y + z − xI ∈ Ei ∩ I}| ≥ C −1 λ2+Cε |I|2 .
Also, since I is bad, we know that
|Ei ∩ I| = |I|M (Ei )(I) ≤ Cλ1−Cε |I|
and thus
|Ei ∩ Pi ∩ I| ≥ C −1 λ1+Cε |I|,
while since I is bad we also know that
|Pi ∩ I| ≤ |(Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I)| ≤ C|I|M (2Pi − Pi )(2I − I) ≤ Cλ1−Cε |I|.
To summarize, we have
C −1 λ1+Cε |I| ≤ |Ei ∩ Pi ∩ I|, |Ei ∩ I|, |Pi ∩ I|, |(Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I)| ≤ Cλ1−Cε |I|
(20)
Observe that every y ∈ Pi ∩ I has at least |Pi ∩ I| representations of the form y = y ′ − t,
where y ′ ∈ Pi ∩ I and t ∈ (Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I). Thus
|{(y ′ , t, z) : y ′ ∈ Pi ∩ I; t ∈ (Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I); z, y ′ − t + z − xI ∈ Ei ∩ I} ≥ C −1 λ3+Cε |I|3 .
Now substitute z ′ := z − t to obtain
|{(y ′ , t, z ′ ) : y ′ ∈ Pi ∩ I; t ∈ (Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I); z ′ + t, z ′ + y ′ − xI ∈ Ei ∩ I} ≥ C −1 λ3+Cε |I|3 .
We can rewrite this as ∑
f (z ′ )g(z ′ ) ≥ C −1 λ3+Cε |I|3
z′
where
f (z ′ ) := |{y ′ ∈ Pi ∩I : z ′ +y ′ −xI ∈ Ei ∩I}|; g(z ′ ) := |{t ∈ (Pi −Pi )∩(I−I) : z ′ +t ∈ Ei ∩I}|.
Now observe from (20) that
∑
f (z ′ ) = |Pi ∩ I||Ei ∩ I| ≤ Cλ2−Cε |I|2
z′
and ∑
g(z ′ ) = |(Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I)||Ei ∩ I| ≤ Cλ2−Cε |I|2
z′
and also
f (z ′ ), g(z ′ ) ≤ |Ei ∩ I| ≤ Cλ1−Cε |I| for all z ′ .
Combining all these bounds for f, g together, we see that there must exist z0 such that
f (z0 ), g(z0 ) ≥ C −1 λ1+Cε |I|.
Let y0 be an arbitrary element of Pi ∩I. Writing y ′ = y0 +t for some t ∈ (Pi −Pi )∩(I −I),
we thus see that
|{t ∈ (Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I) : z0 + y0 − xI + t ∈ Ei ∩ I}|,
(21)
|{t ∈ (Pi − Pi ) ∩ (I − I) : z0 + t ∈ Ei ∩ I}| ≥ C −1 λ1+Cε |I|.
A TRILINEAR MAXIMAL FUNCTION 11
|{xI : T (Ω̃, Ω̃, Ω̃)([xI − 5|Imin |, xI + 5|Imin |]) ≥ Cλ2+Cε }| ≤ Cλ1/3−(A+C)ε |Ii |
and (16) then follows from Lemma 3.5 if ε is sufficiently small depending on A.
12 CIPRIAN DEMETER, TERENCE TAO, AND CHRISTOPH THIELE
References
[1] A. Balog, E. Szemerédi, A statistical theorem of set addition, Combinatorica, 14 (1994), 263–268.
[2] T. Gowers, A new proof of Szemerédi’s theorem for arithmetic progressions of length four, GAFA 8
(1998), 529–551.
[3] B. Green, I. Ruzsa, Sets with small sumsets and rectification, preprint. math.NT/0403338
[4] I. Ruzsa, An analog of Freiman’s theorem in groups, Structure theory of set addition, Astérisque No.
258 (1999), 323–326.