Cardinalities of $g$-difference sets

Eric Schmutz, Michael Tait

Published 2025-01-20Version 1

Let $\eta_{g}(n) $ be the smallest cardinality that $A\subseteq {\mathbb Z}$ can have if $A$ is a $g$-difference basis for $[n]$ (i.e, if, for each $x\in [n]$, there are {\em at least} $g$ solutions to $a_{1}-a_{2}=x$ ). We prove that the finite, non-zero limit $\lim\limits_{n\rightarrow \infty}\frac{\eta_{g}(n)}{\sqrt{n}}$ exists, answering a question of Kravitz. We also investigate a similar problem in the setting of a vector space over a finite field. Let $\alpha_g(n)$ be the largest cardinality that $A\subseteq [n]$ can have if, for all nonzero $x$, $a_{1}-a_{2}=x$ has {\em at most} $g$ solutions. We also prove that $\alpha_g(n)={\sqrt{gn}}(1+o_{g}(1))$ as $n\rightarrow\infty$.