The concentration function of additive functions with nonmultiplicative weight (Q1889673)

Let \(g\) be a real-valued additive function. The main result of the paper asserts that for every \(a\) and \(N\) we have \[ \sum_{n < N, a\leq g(n)<a+1} \tau(N-n) \leq CN \log N W(N)^{-1/2} , \] where \[ W(N) = 4 + \min_\lambda \biggl( \lambda^2 + \sum_{p<N} p^{-1} \min( 1, (g(p)- \lambda \log p)^2 )\biggr) . \] With weights equal to 1 the analogous estimate is due to the reviewer [Acta Math. Acad. Sci. Hung. 36, 215--232 (1980; Zbl 0471.10034)]. The above result shows that (in a special sense) the additive function \(g(n)\) and the ``reflected'' multiplicative weight \(\tau(N-n)\) are independent. This is somewhat surprising; one would rather expect a dependence on the multiplicative properties of \(N\) like in the number of representations as sums of primes.