An analogue of Ruzsa's conjecture for polynomials over finite fields (Q2221812)

Let \(\mathbb{N}\) be the set of positive integers. A strong form of a conjecture by Ruzsa is stated as follows. Suppose that \(f:\mathbb{N}\cup\{0\}\rightarrow \mathbb{Z}\) satisfies the following two conditions: \begin{itemize} \item [(C1)] \(f(n+p)\equiv f(n)\) mod \(p\) for every prime \(p\) and every \(n\in \mathbb{N}\cup \{0\}\); \item [(C2)] \(\displaystyle\limsup_{n\to\infty}\frac{\log\vert f(n)\vert}{n}<e\). \end{itemize} Then \(f\) is necessarily a polynomial. In this paper, the authors study an analogue of this conjecture for the ring of polynomials over a finite field. More precisely, let \(\mathbb{F}_q\) be a finite field of order \(q\), \(q=p^\ell\) is a prime power. Let \(\mathcal{A}=\mathbb{F}_q[t]\) and \(\mathcal{K}=\mathbb{F}_q(t)\). Let \(\mathtt{deg}: \mathcal{A}\to \mathbb{N}\cup \{0, \infty\}\) be the usual degree map. A map \(f: \mathcal{A}\to \mathcal{A}\) is called a polynomial map if it is given by values on \(\mathcal{A}\) of an element of \(\mathcal{K}[X]\). Let \(\mathcal{P}\subset \mathcal{A}\) be the set of irreducible polynomials. In view of Ruzsa's conjecture, the authors ask the following question. Let \(f:\mathcal{A}\rightarrow\mathcal{A}\) be a map satisfying the following two conditions: \begin{itemize} \item [(C3)] \(f(A+BP)\equiv f(A) \bmod P\) for every \(A,B\in\mathcal{A}\) and \(P\in\mathcal{P}\); \item [(C4)] \(\displaystyle\limsup_{\deg(A)\to\infty}\frac{\log\deg(f(A))}{\deg(A)}<q\). \end{itemize} Is it true that \(f\) is a polynomial map? In this paper, the authors provide an affirmative answer to this question by showing that if \(f: \mathcal{A}\to\mathcal{A}\) is a prime congruence-preserving map such that \[ \deg(f(A))<\frac{q^{\deg(A)}}{27q\deg(A)} \] when \(\deg(A)\) is large enough, then \(f\) is a polynomial map.