An analogue of Shidlovskii's lemma for certain \(q\)-difference equations (Q1396530)

Let \(f_1,\ldots,f_m\) in \({\mathcal C}[[z]]\) be irrational solutions of the \(q\)-difference equations \(P_i(z)f_i(qz)=Q_i(z)f_i(z)+R_i(z)\) for \(1\leq i\leq m\), where \(q\) is a complex number with \(|q|>1\), \(P_i, Q_i, R_i\) are in \({\mathcal C}[z]\), each \(P_i\) has non-zero constant term, and \(Q_i\) has lowest degree term \(\alpha_iz^{s_i}\) with positive integers \(s_i\). Let \(L_i(z)=\sum_{j=0}^m A_j(z)f_j(z)\) with \(A_j(z)\) in \({\mathcal C}[z]\) not all zero and \(F_0(z)=1\). Starting from \(L(z)=L_0(z)\), we define \(L_i(z)\) inductively by \(L_i(z)=P(z)L_{i-1}(qz)\) for \(1\leq i\leq m\) where \(P(z)=P_1(z)\cdots P_m(z)\). Because of the functional equations, the \(L_i(z)\) can be expressed as linear forms \(L_i(z)=\sum_{j=0}^m A_{ij}(z)f_j(z)\) with coefficients \(A_{ij}(z)\) in \({\mathcal C}[z]\). By analogy with Shidlovskii's lemma, the authors seek conditions under which \(D(z)=\det(A_{ij}(z))_{0\leq i,j\leq m}\) is non-zero. The first condition is that \(\alpha_i/\alpha_j\neq q^k\) for any \(k\) when \(i\neq j\) and \(s_i=s_j\). This implies that \(1,f_1(z)\ldots,f_m(z)\) are linearly independent over \({\mathcal C}(z)\). The second condition is that \(\operatorname {ord} L\geq mn+c_1{m+1\choose 2}+c_2m-{m\choose 2}\min_{1\leq j\leq m}s_j\), where the \(A_j\) have degrees at most \(n\) and \(c_1, c_2\) are given explicitly in terms of the degrees of the polynomials \(P_j, Q_j\) and \(R_j\). Then \(D(z)\neq 0\). The authors give a similar result for the case \(R_i(z)=0\).