Characterization of \(p_ n\)-sequences for nonidempotent algebras (Q1820183)

Let \(<p_ n>\) be a sequence of nonnegative integers. \(<p_ n>\) is representable if there exists an algebra A such that \(p_ n\) is equal to the number of essentially n-ary polynomials of A (excluding the unary projection). It is known that \(<p_ n>\) is representable (with \(p_ 0\) or \(p_ 1\) positive) iff at least one of the following conditions holds: (i) \(p_ 0>0\), (ii) \(p_ n>0\) for all \(n>1\), (iii) n divides \(p_ n\) for all \(n>1\), (iv) \(p_{2n}=\sum^{n}_{k=1}a_ k\left( \begin{matrix} 2n\\ 2k-1\end{matrix} \right)\) for some nonnegative integers \(a_ k\) and \(p_{2n+1}>0\) for all \(n\geq 0\). It is easy to verify (i), (ii) and (iii) but (iv) is rather complicated. The aim of the paper is to simplify it. It is proved that if A is without constants and \(p_{2m}=0\) for some \(m>0\) and \(p_{2n+1}>0\) for all \(n\geq 0\) then (iv) holds. A corollary of this fact is given. In contrast to previous papers on this problem, the author uses some nontrivial results of permutation group theory and the results of Schur on linear diophantine equations.