An analogue of Ruzsa's conjecture for polynomials over finite fields

Abstract

In 1971, Ruzsa conjectured that if $f:\ \mathbb{N}\rightarrow\mathbb{Z}$ with $f(n+k)\equiv f(n)$ mod $k$ for every $n,k\in\mathbb{N}$ and $f(n)=O(\theta^n)$ with $\theta<e$ then $f$ is a polynomial. In this paper, we investigate the analogous problem for the ring of polynomials over a finite field.