On a certain class of infinite products with an application to arithmetical semigroups (Q920141)

Let \(\{\pi (n)\}_{n\in {\mathbb{N}}}\) be a sequence of real numbers such that \(\pi (n)\ll q^ n\) holds for all \(n\in {\mathbb{N}}\) with some constant \(q>1\). Then the function \[ f(z):=\prod^{\infty}_{n=1}(1-z^ n)^{- \pi (n)}=1+\sum^{\infty}_{n=1}\gamma (n)z^ n \] is holomorphic for \(| z| <q^{-1}\), and the relations \[ \pi (n)\in {\mathbb{Z}}\text{ for all } n\in {\mathbb{N}}\quad \Leftrightarrow \quad \gamma (n)\in {\mathbb{Z}}\text{ for all } n\in {\mathbb{N}} \] and \[ \pi (n)>0\text{ for all } n\in {\mathbb{N}}\quad \Leftrightarrow \quad \gamma (n)>\pi (n)\text{ for all } n\in {\mathbb{N}} \] hold. The main aim of this paper is to investigate consequences of the following axiom: (V) There is some \(R>q^{-1}\) such that f can be analytically continued on the disc \(| z| <R\) to a meromorphic function which has exactly one pole of order 1 at \(q^{-1}.\) In particular, the following theorems hold. Theorem 1. Let (V) be fulfilled. Put \(\sigma (n):=q^{-n}\sum_{d| n}d\pi (d)\). Then the following two assertions hold: (i) If f has no zeros of modulus 1/q then for every r, \(1/q<r<R\), one has \[ \sigma (n)=1- \sum^{\ell}_{j=1}(qb_ j)^{-n}+O((qr)^{-n}), \] where \(b_ j\) \((1\leq j\leq \ell =\ell (r))\) are the zeros of f with \(1/q<| b_ j| <r\), counted according to their multiplicities. (ii) If \(\pi\) (n)\(\geq 0\) for all n, and if f has zeros of modulus 1/q then f has exactly one zero in the disc \(| z| <R\). It is located at -1/q and has order 1. By an example it is shown that the case (ii) of Theorem 1 can occur. A necessary condition for f(z) having a zero at \(-q^{-1}\) is given in Theorem 2. Assume (V) with \(R\geq q^{-1/2}\), and let \(\pi (n)\in {\mathbb{N}}_ 0\) for all n. Then, if \(f(-q^{-1})=0\), we have \[ f(x)f(- x)\gg (1-q^{1/2}x)^{-1}\text{ for } x\to q^{-1/2},\quad 0<x<q^{- 1/2}. \] As an application to arithmetical semigroups the above results give a correct version of the ``abstract prime number theorem'' of \textit{J. Knopfmacher} [``Analytic arithmetic of algebraic function fields'' (1979; Zbl 0411.10001)] and \textit{S. D. Cohen} [Math. Proc. Camb. Philos. Soc. 106, 7-12 (1989; Zbl 0679.10037)].