On the automaticity of the Hankel determinants of a family of automatic sequences (Q2330106)

The paper is concerned with a family of automatic sequences which generalises the Thue-Morse sequence. Let \(d\ge 2\) be a positive integer and \(\mathbf{v} = \{v_1,v_2,\ldots,v_{d-1}\}\) be a \(\pm1\) sequence with \(v_0=1\). The generating function of \(\mathbf{v}\) is \(\tilde{\mathbf{v}}(x) = \sum_{i=0}^{d-1} v_ix^i\). Define the \(\pm1\) sequence \(\mathbf{f}\) by the power series \(\tilde{\mathbf{f}}(x) = \sum_{n=0}^\infty f_nx^n = \prod_{k=0}^\infty\tilde{\mathbf{v}}(x^{d^k})\) so that \(f_n = \prod_{i=1}^{d-1} v_i^{s_{d,i}(n)}\) where \(s_{d,i}(n)\) counts the number of occurrences of the digit \(i\) in the base \(d\) representation of \(n\). The power series \(\tilde{\mathbf{f}}\) is an example of a Mahler function and satisfies the functional equation \(\tilde{\mathbf{f}}(x) = \tilde{\mathbf{v}}(x)\tilde{\mathbf{f}}(x^d)\), giving the recurrence relations \(f_0=1, f_{dn+1}=v_if_n\) for \(n\ge 0, 0\le i\le d-1\). Let \(H_n(\mathbf{f})\) be the \(n\times n\) Hankel determinant of the sequence \(\mathbf{f}\). Since the Hankel determinant of order \(n\) of a \(\pm1\) sequence is always divisible by \(2^{n-1}\), define the reduced Hankel determinant \(H_n(\mathbf{f})/2^{n-1}\).The main result of the paper is that the sequence of reduced Hankel determinants modulo 2 is \(d\)-automatic. \textit{J.-P. Allouche} et al. [Ann. Inst. Fourier 48, No. 1, 1--27 (1998; Zbl 0974.11010)] proved that the Hankel determinants of the Thue-Morse sequence are non-zero. The proof of automaticity in the paper uses an algorithm of \textit{H. Fu} and \textit{G.-N. Han} [in: Proceedings of the 41st international symposium on symbolic and algebraic computation, ISSAC 2016, New York, NY: ACM, 231--238 (2016; Zbl 1364.11070)]. Two examples are given to illustrate the algorithm and exhibit the recurrence relations and the minimal automaton whose output is the sequence of reduced Hankel determinants modulo 2. \textit{Y. Bugeaud} et al. [Int. Math. Res. Not. 2016, No. 5, 1467--1496 (2016; Zbl 1415.11101)] showed that if \(f(x)\) is a Mahler function and \(b\ge 2\) is an integer satisfying certain regularity conditions and there is an increasing sequence of positive integers \((a_i)_{i\ge 0}\) such that \(H_{a_i}(f) \ne 0\) for all integers \(i\ge 0\) and \(\lim\sup_{i\rightarrow \infty} a_{i+1}/a_i = \rho\), then \(f(1/b)\) is transcendental and its irrationality exponent satisfies \(\mu(f(1/b)) \le (1+\rho)\min\{\rho^2,d\}\). These conditions are satisfied by the automatic sequences considered in the paper because the reduced Hankel determinants are automatic. In particular, if \(\rho=1\) then the irrationality exponent of \(f(1/b)\) is 2. Bugeaud et al. showed that this applies to the Thue-Morse sequence which therefore has irrationality exponent exactly 2.