Let and be the set of nonnegative integers and rational numbers, respectively. Define the function by and
Prove that is one-to-one, and determine its range.
Solution
We prove that the range of is the set of rational numbers of the form for and (also known as the dyadic rational numbers). For , we write to mean that the numerator of , when written in lowest terms, is divisible by 3. Define the function by declaring that for , is the unique element of such that .
We first check that is one-to-one. Suppose that for some with ; choose such a pair with minimal. Now note that and from the definition of . Hence . Choose the that is congruent to and modulo 3, and put and . Then , but and since . This contradicts the choice of and . Hence no such pairs exist.
We next verify that , which clearly contains the range of , is in fact equal to it. Define the map by setting . Then is in the image of whenever is: if , then . Hence it suffices to show that if one starts from and applies repeatedly, one eventually ends up with an element of the range of .
First note that if is not an integer, then has the same denominator as , and has denominator half of that. Hence some is an integer.
Next, by the Triangle Inequality,
whenever . Thus, our process eventually hits an integer of absolute value bounded by 4. Simple computation yields the following table:
| x | -4 | -3 | -2 | -1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| h(x) | 4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | -2 | -2 |
¿From the table, it is clear that starting from any point in , within 4 applications of , our process hits zero. Since , this value is in the range of , so we are done.