Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2019/ib/paper-3/9h/c/solution

Suppose and communicate. Choose with and . Then is a possible return time to , so divides . If is any possible return time to , concatenating the paths gives a return to of length . Thus also divides , and subtraction shows that divides every such . Therefore . Interchanging and gives the reverse divisibility, so
Hence period is constant on a communicating class.

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