On sums of powers of zeros of polynomials (Q1128071): Difference between revisions

Let \(P_N(x)\) denote a family of polynomials with \(P_N\) of degree \(N\). Motivated by problems in theoretical physics the author is interested in determining formulas for the moments of the zeros of \(P_N\). Let \(m_r(N)\) be the sum of the \(r\)th powers of the zeros of \(P_N\) normalized by dividing by \(N\) and let \(G(N,z) = \sum_{r=0}^\infty m_r(N)z^r\) be the moment generating function of the zeros, i.e. \(P_N'(1/z)/(Nz P_N(1/z))\). The author computes \(G(N,z)\) for the classical orthogonal polynomials (Chebyshev, Jacobi, Laguerre, Hermite) and notes that in these cases \(G(N,z)\) satisfies a Riccati differential equation. He then discusses how to use the Perron-Stieltjes inversion formula to obtain the distribution function of the zeros of \(P_N\) from \(G(N,z)\) and discusses the asymptotic distribution as \(N \to \infty\).