An improved lower bound related to the Furstenberg-Sárközy theorem (Q2256129)

Summary: Let \(D(n)\) denote the cardinality of the largest subset of the set \(\{1,2,\dots,n\}\) such that the difference of no pair of distinct elements is a square. A well-known theorem of Furstenberg and Sárközy states that \(D(n)=o(n)\). In the other direction, \textit{I. Z. Ruzsa} [Period. Math. Hung. 15, 205--209 (1984; Zbl 0552.10035)] has proven that \(D(n) \gtrsim n^{\gamma}\) for \(\gamma = \frac{1}{2}\left( 1 + \frac{\log 7}{\log 65} \right) \approx 0.733077\). We improve this to \(\gamma = \frac{1}{2}\left( 1 + \frac{\log 12}{\log 205} \right) ~\approx 0.733412\).