Some amazing facts about \(4\)-cores (Q1924211)

A \(t\)-core is a partition without any hooks of length \(t\). Equivalently, if \(\lambda_i\) is the \(i\)th largest part and \(\lambda_j'\) is the \(j\)th largest part of the conjugate partition, then a \(t\)-core is a partition for which there is no pair \((i,j)\) with \(\lambda_i\lambda_j'>0\) and \(\lambda_i+\lambda_j'=i+j+t-1\). Let \(a_4(n)\) be the number of 4-cores of \(n\). The authors prove that for \(k\geq 1\): \[ \begin{aligned} a_4\bigl(3^{2k+1}n+(5\cdot 3^{2k}-5)/8\bigr) &=3^ka_4(3n),\\ a_4\bigl(3^{2k+1}n+(13\cdot 3^{2k}-5)/8\bigr) &=(2\cdot 3^k-1)a_4(3n+1),\\ a_4\bigl(3^{2k+2}n+(7\cdot 3^{2k+1}-5)/8\bigr) &={3^{k+1}-1\over 2}a_4(9n+2).\end{aligned} \] {}.