Integers without large prime factors in short intervals: conditional results (Q353945)

Let \(\zeta\) be the Riemann zeta-function. The famous Riemann hypothesis states that all non trivial zeros of \(\zeta(s)\) lie on the critical line \(\text{Re}\, s=1/2\). Let \(N(t)\) denote the number of zeros of \(\zeta(\sigma+\text{i}u)\) in the region \(0<\sigma<1\), \(0<u\leq t\). It is well known that \[ N(t)=\frac{t}{2\pi}\log\frac{t}{2\pi}-\frac{t}{2\pi}+\frac78+S(t)+O\left(\tfrac{1}{t}\right),\;t\geq 2, \] where, if \(t\) is not the ordinate of a zero, \(S(t)\) denotes the value of \(\frac{1}{\pi}\arg\zeta\left(\frac12+\text{i}t\right)\) obtained by continuous variation along the straight line segments joining \(0,2,2+\text{i}t\) and \(1/2+\text{i}t\). If \(t\) is the ordinate of a zero, we set \[ S(t)=\lim_{\varepsilon\downarrow0} (S(t+\varepsilon)-S(t-\varepsilon)). \] In the paper, the following is the main result. Let \(\varepsilon\) and \(\alpha\) be a pair of positive numbers. Under the Riemann hypothesis and the conjectural bound \(S(t)\ll(\log t)^{1/2+\varepsilon}\), there exists \(X_0=X_0(\varepsilon, \alpha)\) such that whenever \(X\geq X_0\) and \(Y\geq\sqrt{X}(\log X)^{1/2+\varepsilon}\) the interval \((X,X+Y]\) contains an integer having no prime factor exceeding \(X^\alpha\).