Noncanonical number systems in the integers (Q1011461)

The author studies digital expansions \(a=\sum_{i=0}^{\ell-1}d_i b^i\) to an integral base \(b\) with \(|b|\geq 2\) and digits \(d_i\) from a digit set \({\mathcal D}\), which consists of one representative of every residue class modulo \(b\). The set \(\mathcal D\) is said to be a valid digit set for \(b\), if every \(a\in \mathbb Z\) can be represented. In this paper, the author does not assume that \(0\) is a digit. It is shown that for every base \(b\) with \(|b|\geq 4\) or \(b=-2\), there are infinitely many valid digit sets, both with and without zero. All valid digit sets for the base \(b=-2\) are characterized.