Limit superior Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-14
The limit superior of a real sequence isallowing a value in the extended real number line. For a finite value , every gives an eventual upper bound , while arbitrarily late terms still satisfy . The second condition concerns recurrence at arbitrarily large indices, not the fraction of indices where a large value occurs.
In limit inferior and limit superior, has limit superior one because its positive branch approaches one from above and all later values eventually stay below . Changing any finite number of terms leaves the limit superior unchanged: once the tail of a sequence begins beyond those positions, all its suprema are the same as before. The sparse peaks can determine a limit superior example shows that even a set of peak indices with zero natural density can decide the upper long-run edge.
Subsequential limit 2026-10-14
A subsequential limit of a sequence is a value approached by some subsequence with strictly increasing indices . For , the subsequences at even integers and odd integers give subsequential limits one and minus one. A finite value appearing among only finitely many initial terms does not become a subsequential limit merely by being a member of the image of a function represented by the sequence.
For a bounded sequence of real numbers, its subsequential limits form a nonempty bounded set that is also a closed set. The Bolzano-Weierstrass theorem guarantees nonemptiness, and its extreme values are the limit inferior and limit superior. The sequence in sparse peaks can determine a limit superior has the two subsequential limits zero and one, despite almost all indices in the natural density sense carrying zero.