Some examples of Mahler measures as multiple polylogarithms (Q1415369)

The author continues the work of Smyth, Boyd, Rodriguez-Villegas, Maillot, Vandervelde and others in obtaining identities relating the logarithm of the Mahler measure of polynomials in several variables to certain \(L\)-functions and polylogarithms. In this paper, the Mahler measure is computed for several interesting series of polynomials having up to five variables. Previously, most examples involved two variable polynomials and just few examples with three variable polynomials were known. Now, the author determines the Mahler measure of \[ P=(1+w_1) \dots (1+w_n)+a(1-w_1)\dots (1-w_n)y \in {\mathbb C}[w_1, \dots, w_n,y], \] where \(a\) is fixed and \(n \leq 3\), and \[ Q=(1+w_1) \dots (1+w_n)(1+x)+a(1-w_1)\dots (1-w_n)(y+z) \in {\mathbb C}[w_1, \dots, w_n,x,y,z], \] where \(n \leq 2\). The most striking example comes by setting \(a=1\) and \(n=2\) into \(Q\). She proves that \[ m((1+x)(1+y)(1+z)+(1-y)(1-z)(u+v))=93 \zeta(5)/\pi^4. \] Another example with a ``short'' expression on the right-hand side is obtained from \(P\) \[ m((1+x)(1+y)+(1-x)(1-y)z) = 7\zeta(3)/\pi^2. \]