No label defined (Q4217652)

Let \(L_{k,n}\) denote the number of permutations of \(n\) distinct objects with greatest cycle length \(k\). The authors compute the exact value for \(L_{k,n}\): \[ \begin{aligned} L_{k,n} &= {n!\over k},\qquad\text{for }{n\over 2}< k\leq n;\\ L_{k,n} &= {n!\over k} \Biggl(1-{1\over 2k}- \sum^{n-2k}_{j= 1}{1\over k+ j}\Biggr),\qquad \text{for }{n\over 3}< k\leq{n\over 2};\end{aligned} \] with ever more complicated formulas for \({n\over 4}< k\leq{n\over 3}\), \({n\over 5}< k\leq{n\over 4}\), etc. They then use these formulas to investigate the expected length of the longest cycle in a random permutation. For the entire collection see [Zbl 0895.00041].