2- and 3-Mahler recurrences (Q1311046)

A celebrated theorem of Cobham states that a sequence which is both \(p\)- automatic and \(q\)-automatic, \(p\) and \(q\) being multiplicatively independent integers, is ultimately periodic. The generating function \(f(x)= \sum a_ n x^ n\) of a \(p\)-automatic sequence \((a_ n)\) satisfies a \(p\)-Mahler equation connecting \(f(x)\) and \(f(x^ p)\). It is therefore natural to conjecture that a power series which satisfies both a \(p\)-Mahler equation and a \(q\)-Mahler equation with \(p\) and \(q\) as before must be a rational function. The author proves a restricted version of such a theorem: if \(p\) and \(q\) are relatively prime and \(a\) and \(b\) are rational functions with \(a(0)= b(0)=1\) and \(\phi\) is meromorphic in a neighbourhood of the origin and satisfies \(\phi(x^ p)= a(x)\phi(x)\) and \(\phi(x^ q)= b(x)\phi(x)\), then \(\phi\) is a rational function. The argument is elementary but ingenious. To illustrate, take \(p=2\), \(q=3\). Let \(a(x)= \prod (x-\alpha)^{f(\alpha)}\), \(b(x)= \prod (x- \alpha)^{g(\alpha)}\). Then \(f(\alpha^ 2)- f(\alpha)= g(\alpha^ 3)- g(\alpha)\). From this, it is possible to construct \(h\) such that \(f(\alpha)= h(\alpha)- h(\alpha^ 3)\) and then \(r(x)= \prod(x- \alpha)^{-h(\alpha)}\) is rational and \(\phi(x)= cr(x)\). It still does not seem easy to give an argument of this type which proves Cobham's theorem in the general case.