If $(A+A)/(A+A)$ is small then the ratio set is large

Abstract

In this paper, we consider the sum-product problem of obtaining lower bounds for the size of the set $$\frac{A+A}{A+A}:=\left \{ \frac{a+b}{c+d} : a,b,c,d \in A, c+d \neq 0 \right\},$$ for an arbitrary finite set $A$ of real numbers. The main result is the bound $$\left| \frac{A+A}{A+A} \right| \gg \frac{|A|^{2+\frac{2}{25}}}{|A:A|^{\frac{1}{25}}\log |A|},$$ where $A:A$ denotes the ratio set of $A$. This improves on a result of Balog and the author (arXiv:1402.5775), provided that the size of the ratio set is subquadratic in $|A|$. That is, we establish that the inequality $$\left| \frac{A+A}{A+A} \right| \ll |A|^{2} \Rightarrow |A:A| \gg \frac{ |A|^2}{\log^{25}|A|} . $$ This extremal result answers a question similar to some conjectures in a recent paper of the author and Zhelezov (arXiv:1410.1156).