Monochromatic and zero-sum sets of nondecreasing diameter (Q1343772)

The authors consider a van der Waerden type number \(f(m, r)\), which is the minimum integer \(n\) such that for every coloring of the integers \(\{1, 2,\dots, n\}\) with \(r\) colors, there exist two monochromatic subsets \(B_1\) and \(B_2\) each with \(m\) integers such that each element of \(B_1\) is less than each element of \(B_2\) and that the diameter of \(B_1\) is less than or equal to the diameter of \(B_2\). They verify that \(f(m, 2)= 5m- 3\), \(f(m, 3)= 9m- 7\), \(12m- 9\leq f(m, 4)\leq 13m- 11\), and asymptotically, \(c_1 mr\leq f(m, r)\leq c_2 mr\log_2 r\). Similar questions are considered when the elements of \(\mathbb{Z}_m\) are used as colors and zero-sum sets are required.