A Note on a Picture-Hanging Puzzle

MaRDI QIDQ6311204zbMATH OpenFDO

Authors Radoslav Fulek, Sergey Avvakumov

Publication date 15 December 2018

Abstract: In the picture-hanging puzzle we are to hang a picture so that the string loops around $n$ nails and the removal of any nail results in a fall of the picture. We show that the length of a sequence representing an element in the free group with $n$ generators that corresponds to a solution of the picture-hanging puzzle must be at least $n{2}^{sqrtlo{g}_{2}n}$. In other words, this is a lower bound on the length of a sequence representing a non-trivial element in the free group with $n$ generators such that if we replace any of the generators by the identity the sequence becomes trivial.

This page was built for publication: A Note on a Picture-Hanging Puzzle

Report a bug (only for logged in users!)Click here to report a bug for this page (MaRDI item Q6311204)