Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge / 2016 / iii / Paper 124 / 3 / c

For an additive arithmetic function $f$, one standard form of the Turán-Kubilius inequality usesIt states, with an absolute constant,For real $f$, this also bounds the variance under the discrete uniform distribution, because centering at the actual expectation minimizes the mean square.

For the prime omega function, $f(p^k)=1$. The Mertens theorem for reciprocal primes states ${\sum }_{p\le N}1/p=\log \log N+O(1)$. The contribution of higher prime powers is bounded by ${\sum }_{p}1/(p(p-1))\le 1$, as proved in 1(a). It follows that $A_{\omega }(N)=\log \log N+O(1)$ and $B_{\omega }(N{)}^2\ll \log \log N$. Writing $L=\log \log N$, the Turán-Kubilius inequality and Chebyshev inequality therefore yieldThe bounded error in $A_{\omega }-L$ is absorbed by, for example, using the threshold $0.005L$ around $A_{\omega }$ for sufficiently large $N$.

For the multiplication table problem, call a pair $(a,b)\in [N{]}^2$ good when $\omega (a),\omega (b)\ge 0.99L$ and $\omega (\gcd (a,b))\le 0.1L$. The preceding Chebyshev inequality excludes only $O(N^2/L)$ pairs by either of the first two conditions. For the greatest common divisor condition, linearity of expectation under uniform sampling of the two coordinates givesMarkov inequality therefore excludes only another $O(N^2/L)$ pairs.

The prime factors of a product form the union of those of its factors. Consequently, for every good pair,On the other hand, apply the proved concentration estimate at $N^2$. Since $\log \log (N^2)=L+\log 2$, for large $N$ every integer $m\le N^2$ with $\omega (m)\ge 1.88L$ is exceptional there. There are only $O(N^2/L)$ such integers. Products of good pairs lie in this exceptional set; products having only bad representations are at most as numerous as the bad pairs. This proves the multiplication-table upper bound, using distinct prime factors alone: