Zeros and convergent subsequences of Stern polynomials (Q695117)

Let \(\{a(n)\}_{n\geq 0}\) denote Stern's diatomic sequence. That is, \(a(0)=0\), \(a(1)=1\) and for \(n\geq 1\), \(a(2n)=a(n)\) and \(a(2n+1)=a(n)+a(n+1)\). \textit{K. Dilcher} and \textit{K. Stolarsky} [Int. J. Number Theory 3, No. 1, 85--103 (2007; Zbl 1117.11017)] introduced a polynomial analogue of the Stern sequence; the Stern polynomials are defined by \(a(0;x)=0\), \(a(1;x)=1\) and for \(n\geq 1\) by \[ \begin{aligned} a(2n;x)&=a(n;x^2)\\ a(2n+1;x)&=xa(n;x^2)+a(n+1;x^2).\end{aligned} \] In this paper, the author studies the zeros of the Stern polynomials. The author proves that the zeros of the Stern polynomials cluster uniformly near the unit circle in the sense of Weyl. Specifically, the author proves that if \(Z_n(\rho)\) is the number of zeros of \(a(n;x)\) in the annulus \(1-\rho\leq |x|\leq 1/(1-\rho),\) and \(Z_n(\theta_1,\theta_2)\) is the number of zeros of \(a(n;x)\) in the sector \(\theta_1\leq \arg x\leq \theta_2\), then for fixed \(\rho,\theta_1\) and \(\theta_2\) satisfying \(0<\rho<1\) and \(0\leq \theta_1<\theta_2\leq 2\pi\), we have \[ \left|\frac{Z_n(\theta_1,\theta_2)}{\deg a(n;x)}-\frac{\theta_1-\theta_2}{2\pi}\right|<16\sqrt{\frac{3\log n-\log 8}{n}}, \] and \[ 0\leq 1-\frac{Z_n(\rho)}{\deg a(n;x)}<\frac{2}{\rho}\cdot \frac{2\log n-\log 8}{n}, \] for all \(n>0\) which are not powers of \(2\).