An asymptotic property for tails of limit periodic continued fractions (Q919127)

The paper treats convergent, limit k-periodic continued fractions \[ (1)\quad^{\infty}_{n=1}(a_ n/b_ n)=\frac{a_ 1}{b_ 1+}\frac{a_ 2}{b_ 2+...},\text{ where } a_ n\neq 0 \] and \[ (2)\quad \lim_{n\to \infty}a_{p+nk}=\tilde a_ p\in {\mathbb{C}},\quad \lim_{n\to \infty}b_{p+nk}=\tilde b_ p\in {\mathbb{C}}\setminus \{0\}. \] The mth tail of such a continued fraction is the continued fraction \[ (3)\quad^{\infty}_{n=1}(a_{m+n}/b_{m+n})= \frac{a_{m+1}}{b_{m+1}+}\frac{a_{m+2}}{b_{m+2}+...} \] for \(m=0,1,2,... \). Then \(K(a_ n/b_ n)\) converges if and only if its mth tail converges. Let \(f^{(m)}\) denote the value of (3). For limit 1- periodic continued fractions \(K(a_ n/1)\) (i.e. \(k=1\) and all \(b_ n=1\) in (1) and (2)), with \(| \arg (\tilde a_ 1+1/4)| <\pi,\) it is well known that \(\lim_{m\to \infty}f^{(m)}=\Gamma\), where \(\Gamma\) is known. The result presented here can for this case be written: \[ \lim_{n\to \infty}\frac{a_{n+1}-\tilde a_ 1}{a_ n-\tilde a_ 1}=t\in {\mathbb{C}}\quad if\text{ and } only\quad if\quad \lim_{m\to \infty}\frac{f^{(m+1)}-\Gamma}{f^{(m)}-\Gamma}=t\in {\mathbb{C}}. \] This can be used to construct faster converging modified approximants for \(K(a_ n/1)\) in this case. Similar results are also proved for continued fractions \(K(1/b_ n)\) and for arbitrary k.