Two remarks on iterates of Euler's totient function (Q652233)

Let \(\varphi_k\) denote the \(k\)th iterate of Euler's \(\varphi\) function. In this paper, the author determines the average values of \(\varphi_k\) and \(1/\varphi_k\). That is, he shows that for each \(k\geq 0\), one has \[ {{1}\over {x}}\sum_{n\leq x} \varphi_k (n)\sim {{3}\over {k!e^{k\gamma}\pi^2}} {{x^2}\over {(\log\log\log x)^k}} \] as \(x\to\infty\). For the proof of this result, the author uses the fact that \(\varphi(n)/\varphi_{k+1}(n)\) has normal order \(k! e^{k\gamma} (\log\log\log n)^k\), a fact established in \textit{P. Erdős, A. Granville, C. Pomerance} and \textit{C. Spiro} [Analytic Number Theory, Proc. Conf. in Honor of Paul Bateman, Boston 1990, Prog. Math. 85, 165--204 (1990; Zbl 0721.11034)]. Secondly, for prime numbers \(p\), the author studies the number of distinct prime factors of the product \(\prod_{k\geq 1} \varphi_k(p)\), showing that this number exceeds \((\log p)^{1/2-\varepsilon}\) for all primes \(p\leq x\) with \(x^{o(1)}\) exceptions. The proof of this last result is elementary.