In mathematics, the field
of logarithmic-exponential transseries is a
non-Archimedean ordered
differential field which extends comparability of
asymptotic
In analytic geometry, an asymptote () of a curve is a line such that the distance between the curve and the line approaches zero as one or both of the ''x'' or ''y'' coordinates Limit of a function#Limits at infinity, tends to infinity. In pro ...
growth rates of
elementary nontrigonometric functions to a much broader class of objects. Each log-exp transseries represents a formal asymptotic behavior, and it can be manipulated formally, and when it converges (or in every case if using special semantics such as through infinite
surreal number
In mathematics, the surreal number system is a total order, totally ordered proper class containing not only the real numbers but also Infinity, infinite and infinitesimal, infinitesimal numbers, respectively larger or smaller in absolute value th ...
s), corresponds to actual behavior. Transseries can also be convenient for representing functions. Through their inclusion of exponentiation and logarithms, transseries are a strong generalization of the
power series
In mathematics, a power series (in one variable) is an infinite series of the form
\sum_^\infty a_n \left(x - c\right)^n = a_0 + a_1 (x - c) + a_2 (x - c)^2 + \dots
where ''a_n'' represents the coefficient of the ''n''th term and ''c'' is a co ...
at infinity (
) and other similar
asymptotic expansion
In mathematics, an asymptotic expansion, asymptotic series or Poincaré expansion (after Henri Poincaré) is a formal series of functions which has the property that truncating the series after a finite number of terms provides an approximation ...
s.
The field
was introduced independently by Dahn-Göring and Ecalle in the respective contexts of
model theory
In mathematical logic, model theory is the study of the relationship between theory (mathematical logic), formal theories (a collection of Sentence (mathematical logic), sentences in a formal language expressing statements about a Structure (mat ...
or exponential fields and of the study of analytic singularity and proof by Ecalle of the Dulac conjectures. It constitutes a formal object, extending the field of exp-log functions of Hardy and the field of accelerando-summable series of Ecalle.
The field
enjoys a rich structure: an ordered field with a notion of generalized series and sums, with a compatible derivation with distinguished antiderivation, compatible exponential and logarithm functions and a notion of formal composition of series.
Examples and counter-examples
Informally speaking, exp-log transseries are ''well-based'' (i.e. reverse well-ordered) formal
Hahn series
In mathematics, Hahn series (sometimes also known as Hahn–Mal'cev–Neumann series) are a type of formal series, formal infinite series. They are a generalization of Puiseux series (themselves a generalization of formal power series) and were fir ...
of real powers of the positive infinite indeterminate
, exponentials, logarithms and their compositions, with real coefficients. Two important additional conditions are that the exponential and logarithmic depth of an exp-log transseries
that is the maximal numbers of iterations of exp and log occurring in
must be finite.
The following formal series are log-exp transseries:
:
:
The following formal series are ''not'' log-exp transseries:
:
— this series is not well-based.
:
— the logarithmic depth of this series is infinite
:
— the exponential and logarithmic depths of this series are infinite
It is possible to define differential fields of transseries containing the two last series; they belong respectively to
and
(see the paragraph ''Using surreal numbers'' below).
Introduction
A remarkable fact is that asymptotic growth rates of elementary nontrigonometric functions and even all functions definable in the model theoretic structure
of the ordered exponential field of real numbers are all comparable:
For all such
and
, we have
or
, where
means
. The
equivalence class
In mathematics, when the elements of some set S have a notion of equivalence (formalized as an equivalence relation), then one may naturally split the set S into equivalence classes. These equivalence classes are constructed so that elements ...
of
under the relation
is the asymptotic behavior of
, also called the ''germ'' of
(or the
germ
Germ or germs may refer to:
Science
* Germ (microorganism), an informal word for a pathogen
* Germ cell, cell that gives rise to the gametes of an organism that reproduces sexually
* Germ layer, a primary layer of cells that forms during embry ...
of
at infinity).
The field of transseries can be intuitively viewed as a formal generalization of these growth rates: In addition to the elementary operations, transseries are closed under "limits" for appropriate sequences with bounded exponential and logarithmic depth. However, a complication is that growth rates are non-
Archimedean and hence do not have the
least upper bound property
In mathematics, the least-upper-bound property (sometimes called completeness, supremum property or l.u.b. property) is a fundamental property of the real numbers. More generally, a partially ordered set has the least-upper-bound property if ever ...
. We can address this by associating a sequence with the least upper bound of minimal complexity, analogously to construction of surreal numbers. For example,
is associated with
rather than
because
decays too quickly, and if we identify fast decay with complexity, it has greater complexity than necessary (also, because we care only about asymptotic behavior, pointwise convergence is not dispositive).
Because of the comparability, transseries do not include oscillatory growth rates (such as
). On the other hand, there are transseries such as
that do not directly correspond to convergent series or real valued functions. Another limitation of transseries is that each of them is bounded by a tower of exponentials, i.e. a finite iteration
of
, thereby excluding
tetration
In mathematics, tetration (or hyper-4) is an operation (mathematics), operation based on iterated, or repeated, exponentiation. There is no standard mathematical notation, notation for tetration, though Knuth's up arrow notation \uparrow \upa ...
and other transexponential functions, i.e. functions which grow faster than any tower of exponentials. There are ways to construct fields of generalized transseries including formal transexponential terms, for instance formal solutions
of the
Abel equation .
Formal construction
Transseries can be defined as formal (potentially infinite) expressions, with rules defining which expressions are valid, comparison of transseries, arithmetic operations, and even differentiation. Appropriate transseries can then be assigned to corresponding functions or germs, but there are subtleties involving convergence. Even transseries that diverge can often be meaningfully (and uniquely) assigned actual growth rates (that agree with the formal operations on transseries) using
accelero-summation, which is a generalization of
Borel summation
In mathematics, Borel summation is a summation method for divergent series, introduced by . It is particularly useful for summing divergent asymptotic series, and in some sense gives the best possible sum for such series. There are several vari ...
.
Transseries can be formalized in several equivalent ways; we use one of the simplest ones here.
A ''transseries'' is a well-based sum,
:
with finite exponential depth, where each
is a nonzero real number and
is a monic transmonomial (
is a transmonomial but is not monic unless the ''coefficient''
; each
is different; the order of the summands is irrelevant).
The sum might be infinite or transfinite; it is usually written in the order of decreasing
.
Here, ''well-based'' means that there is no infinite ascending sequence
(see
well-ordering
In mathematics, a well-order (or well-ordering or well-order relation) on a set is a total ordering on with the property that every non-empty subset of has a least element in this ordering. The set together with the ordering is then called ...
).
A ''monic transmonomial'' is one of 1, ''x'', log ''x'', log log ''x'', ..., ''e''
purely_large_transseries.
: ''Note:'' Because
, we do not include it as a primitive, but many authors do; ''log-free'' transseries do not include
but
is permitted. Also, circularity in the definition is avoided because the purely_large_transseries (above) will have lower exponential depth; the definition works by recursion on the exponential depth. See "Log-exp transseries as iterated Hahn series" (below) for a construction that uses
and explicitly separates different stages.
A ''purely large transseries'' is a nonempty transseries
with every
.
Transseries have ''finite exponential depth'', where each level of nesting of ''e'' or log increases depth by 1 (so we cannot have ''x'' + log ''x'' + log log ''x'' + ...).
Addition of transseries is termwise:
(absence of a term is equated with a zero coefficient).
''Comparison:''
The most significant term of
is
for the largest
(because the sum is well-based, this exists for nonzero transseries).
is positive iff the coefficient of the most significant term is positive (this is why we used 'purely large' above). ''X'' > ''Y'' iff ''X'' − ''Y'' is positive.
''Comparison of monic transmonomials:''
:
– these are the only equalities in our construction.
:
:
iff
(also
).
''Multiplication:''
:
:
This essentially applies the distributive law to the product; because the series is well-based, the inner sum is always finite.
''Differentiation:''
:
:
:
:
(division is defined using multiplication).
With these definitions, transseries is an ordered differential field. Transseries is also a
valued field, with the valuation
given by the leading monic transmonomial, and the corresponding asymptotic relation defined for
by
if