On the system $f(nx)$ and probabilistic number theory

Abstract

Let $f: {\mathbb R}\to {\mathbb R}$ be a measurable function satisfying \begin{equation*} f(x+1)=f(x), \qquad \int_0^1 f(x)\, dx=0, \qquad \int_0^1 f^2(x)\, dx<\infty. \end{equation*} The asymptotic properties of series $\sum c_k f(kx)$ have been studied extensively in the literature and turned out to be, in general, quite different from those of the trigonometric system. As the theory shows, the behavior of such series is determined by a combination of analytic, probabilistic and number theoretic effects, resulting in highly interesting phenomena not encountered in classical harmonic analysis. In this paper we survey some recent results in the field and prove asymptotic results for the system $\{f(nx), n\ge 1\}$ in the case when the function $f$ is not square integrable.