Number of ordered factorizations and recursive divisors

Abstract

The number of ordered factorizations and the number of recursive divisors are two related arithmetic functions that are recursively defined. But it is hard to construct explicit representations of these functions. Taking advantage of their recursive definition and a geometric interpretation, we derive three closed-form expressions for them both. These expressions shed light on the structure of these functions and their number-theoretic properties. Surprisingly, both functions can be expressed as simple generalized hypergeometric functions.