On the reduced length of a polynomial with real coefficients (Q873783)

In [Bull. Lond. Math. Soc. 38, No. 1, 70--80 (2006; Zbl 1164.11025)] the reviewer introduced the reduced length \(l(P)\) of a polynomial \(P \in {\mathbb R}[x]\) as the infimum of the usual length \(L(PG)\) taken over every monic polynomial \(G \in {\mathbb R}[x]\). In this paper, the author proves six theorems concerning the quantity \(l(P)\). Suppose that \(P\) is monic of degree \(d\) with \(P(0) \neq 0\). The main theorem asserts that then \(l(P)\) is the infimum of \(L(Q)\), where \(Q\) runs over the set of all monic polynomials in \({\mathbb R}[x]\) divisible by \(P\) with \(Q(0) \neq 0\) which have at most \(d+1\) non-zero coefficients, all belonging to the field \(K(P)\), generated by the coefficients of \(P\). From this, he derives that if \(P \in {\mathbb R}[x]\) has all zeros outside the unit circle, then \(l(P)\) is attained, i.e., \(l(P)=L(PG)\) for some monic \(G \in {\mathbb R}[x]\), effectively computable, and \(l(P) \in K(P)\). Theorem 3 asserts that if \(Q\) is monic and have all zeros on the unit circle then \(l(PQ^m)=l(PQ)\) for all \(m \in {\mathbb N}\). Theorem 4 implies that if \(P \in {\mathbb R}[x]\) has all its roots on the unit circle then \(l(P)=2.\) The theorems of this paper cover all cases for quadratic polynomials \(P\), i.e., one can find \(l(a_2 x^2 + a_1 x+ a_0)\) for any coefficients \(a_2, a_1, a_0 \in {\mathbb R}\). However, the case of determining \(l(2x^3+3x^2+4)\) is open. It is also not known whether \(l(P) \in K(P)\) for all \(P \in {\mathbb R}[x]\) with no zeros inside the unit circle.