A local $\mathit{Tb}$ theorem is an $L^{2}$ boundedness criterion by which the question of the global behavior of an operator is reduced to its local behavior, acting on a family of test functions $b_{Q}$ indexed by the dyadic cubes. We present two versions of such results, in particular, treating square function operators whose kernels do not satisfy the standard Littlewood–Paley pointwise estimates. As an application of one version of the local $\mathit{Tb}$ theorem, we show how the solvability of the Kato problem (which was implicitly based on local $\mathit{Tb}$ theory) may be deduced from this general criterion.

We show that the $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}=\infty$ conjecture implies the Riemann hypothesis.

We study the problem of Diophantine approximation on lines in $\mathbb{R}^{d}$ under certain primality restrictions.

For any given integer $k\geqslant 2$ we prove the existence of infinitely many $q$ and characters $\unicode[STIX]{x1D712}\,(\text{mod}\;q)$ of order $k$ such that $|L(1,\unicode[STIX]{x1D712})|\geqslant (\text{e}^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FE}}+o(1))\log \log q$. We believe this bound to be the best possible. When the order $k$ is even, we obtain similar results for $L(1,\unicode[STIX]{x1D712})$ and $L(1,\unicode[STIX]{x1D712}\unicode[STIX]{x1D709})$, where $\unicode[STIX]{x1D712}$ is restricted to even (or odd) characters of order $k$ and $\unicode[STIX]{x1D709}$ is a fixed quadratic character. As an application of these results, we exhibit large even-order character sums, which are likely to be optimal.

We study two-weight norm inequalities for a vector-valued operator from a weighted $L^{p}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E})$-space to mixed norm $L_{l^{s}}^{q}(\unicode[STIX]{x1D707})$ spaces, $1<p<\infty$, $0<q<p$. We apply these results to the boundedness of Wolff’s potentials.

Consider a system of polynomials in many variables over the ring of integers of a number field $K$. We prove an asymptotic formula for the number of integral zeros of this system in homogeneously expanding boxes. As a consequence, any smooth and geometrically integral variety $X\subseteq \mathbb{P}_{K}^{m}$ satisfies the Hasse principle, weak approximation, and the Manin–Peyre conjecture if only its dimension is large enough compared to its degree. This generalizes work of Skinner, who considered the case where all polynomials have the same degree, and recent work of Browning and Heath-Brown, who considered the case where $K=\mathbb{Q}$. Our main tool is Skinner’s number field version of the Hardy–Littlewood circle method. As a by-product, we point out and correct an error in Skinner’s treatment of the singular integral.

We generalize to higher dimensions the Bavard–Ghys construction of the hyperbolic metric on the space of polygons with fixed directions of edges. The space of convex $d$-dimensional polyhedra with fixed directions of facet normals has a decomposition into type cones that correspond to different combinatorial types of polyhedra. This decomposition is a subfan of the secondary fan of a vector configuration and can be analyzed with the help of Gale diagrams. We construct a family of quadratic forms on each of the type cones using the theory of mixed volumes. The Alexandrov–Fenchel inequalities ensure that these forms have exactly one positive eigenvalue. This introduces a piecewise hyperbolic structure on the space of similarity classes of polyhedra with fixed directions of facet normals. We show that some of the dihedral angles on the boundary of the resulting cone-manifold are equal to $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70B}/2$.

We say that a planar set $A$ has the Kakeya property if there exist two different positions of $A$ such that $A$ can be continuously moved from the first position to the second within a set of arbitrarily small area. We prove that if $A$ is closed and has the Kakeya property, then the union of the non-trivial connected components of $A$ can be covered by a null set which is either the union of parallel lines or the union of concentric circles. In particular, if $A$ is closed, connected and has the Kakeya property, then $A$ can be covered by a line or a circle.

Assuming the Riemann Hypothesis, Soundararajan [Ann. of Math. (2) 170 (2009), 981–993] showed that $\int _{0}^{T}|\unicode[STIX]{x1D701}(1/2+\text{i}t)|^{2k}\ll T(\log T)^{k^{2}+\unicode[STIX]{x1D716}}$. His method was used by Chandee [Q. J. Math.62 (2011), 545–572] to obtain upper bounds for shifted moments of the Riemann Zeta function. Building on these ideas of Chandee and Soundararajan, we obtain, conditionally, upper bounds for shifted moments of Dirichlet $L$-functions which allow us to derive upper bounds for moments of theta functions.

Let $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}$ be an arithmetic function and let ${\mathcal{B}}$ be the set of positive integers $n=p_{1}^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{1}}\cdots p_{k}^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{k}}$ which satisfy $p_{j+1}\leqslant \unicode[STIX]{x1D703}(p_{1}^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{1}}\cdots p_{j}^{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}_{j}})$ for $0\leqslant j<k$. We show that ${\mathcal{B}}$ has a natural density, provide a criterion to determine whether this density is positive, and give various estimates for the counting function of ${\mathcal{B}}$. When $\unicode[STIX]{x1D703}(n)/n$ is non-decreasing, the set ${\mathcal{B}}$ coincides with the set of integers $n$ whose divisors $1=d_{1}<d_{2}<\cdots <d_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D70F}(n)}=n$ satisfy $d_{j+1}\leqslant \unicode[STIX]{x1D703}(d_{j})$ for $1\leqslant j<\unicode[STIX]{x1D70F}(n)$.

Euler noted the relation $6^{3}\,=\,3^{3}+4^{3}+5^{3}$ and asked for other instances of cubes that are sums of consecutive cubes. Similar problems have been studied by Cunningham, Catalan, Gennochi, Lucas, Pagliani, Cassels, Uchiyama, Stroeker and Zhongfeng Zhang. In particular, Stroeker determined all squares that can be written as a sum of at most 50 consecutive cubes. We generalize Stroeker’s work by determining all perfect powers that are sums of at most 50 consecutive cubes. Our methods include descent, linear forms in two logarithms and Frey–Hellegouarch curves.

We study the Hausdorff measure and dimension of the set of intrinsically simultaneously $\unicode[STIX]{x1D713}$-approximable points on a curve, surface, etc, given as a graph of integer polynomials. We obtain complete answers to these questions for algebraically “nice” manifolds. This generalizes earlier work done in the case of curves.

We present a first example of a flag vector of a polyhedral sphere that is not the flag vector of any polytope. Namely, there is a unique $3$-sphere with the parameters $(f_{0},f_{1},f_{2},f_{3};f_{02})=(12,40,40,12;120)$, but this sphere is not realizable by a convex $4$-polytope. The $3$-sphere, which is $2$-simple and $2$-simplicial, was found by Werner [Linear constraints on face numbers of polytopes. PhD Thesis, TU Berlin, Germany, 2009]; we present results of a computer enumeration which imply that the sphere with these parameters is unique. We prove that it is non-polytopal in two ways: first, we show that it has no oriented matroid, and thus it is not realizable; this proof was found by computer, but can be verified by hand. The second proof is again a computer-based oriented matroid proof and shows that for exactly one of the facets this sphere does not even have a diagram based on this facet. Using the non-polytopality, we finally prove that the sphere is not even embeddable as a polytopal complex.

We provide new quantitative versions of Helly’s theorem. For example, we show that for every family $\{P_{i}:i\in I\}$ of closed half-spaces in $\mathbb{R}^{n}$ such that $P=\bigcap _{i\in I}P_{i}$ has positive volume, there exist $s\leqslant \unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC}n$ and $i_{1},\ldots ,i_{s}\in I$ such that

$$\begin{eqnarray}\operatorname{vol}_{n}(P_{i_{1}}\cap \cdots \cap P_{i_{s}})\leqslant (Cn)^{n}\operatorname{vol}_{n}(P),\end{eqnarray}$$

$\unicode[STIX]{x1D6FC},C>0$

We apply multigrade efficient congruencing to estimate Vinogradov’s integral of degree $k$ for moments of order $2s$, establishing strongly diagonal behaviour for $1\leqslant s\leqslant \frac{1}{2}k(k+1)-\frac{1}{3}k+o(k)$. In particular, as $k\rightarrow \infty$, we confirm the main conjecture in Vinogradov’s mean value theorem for a proportion asymptotically approaching $100\%$ of the critical interval $1\leqslant s\leqslant \frac{1}{2}k(k+1)$.