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Summary. In his lost notebook, Ramanujan recorded without a proof the value of an elegant
periodic continued fraction. The authors provide an elementary proof of a corrected version of
Ramanujan’s claim.
In the spring of 1976, George Andrews discovered a sheaf of 138 pages of Ramanu-
jan’s mathematics in the library at Trinity College, Cambridge. This manuscript
was in the possession of the English mathematician G. N. Watson at the time of
his death in 1965, and was sent to Trinity College Library on December 26, 1968
by R. A. Rankin of the University of Glasgow. Although technically neither lost
nor a notebook, in view of the fame of Ramanujan’s notebooks, it was natural
for Andrews to call his discovery Ramanujan’s lost notebook. When Ramanujan’s
lost notebook was photocopied and published in 1988, other manuscripts and frag-
ments by Ramanujan from the libraries at Cambridge and Oxford were included
in the volume [2]. The continued fraction in the title of this paper does not appear
in Ramanujan’s lost notebook, but in one of these fragments published with the
lost notebook [2, p. 341]. We state next Ramanujan’s claim about this continued
fraction.
Agency.
258 B. C. Berndt and G. Choi AEM
then
sµ
¶2
1 µn+1 µn+1
−c + b + c+b + (−1)n µ2n+1
2 µn µn
1 1 1 b 1 1
= , (2)
a + a + ··· + a + c + a + a + ···
1
where in each grouping, there are n fractions a.
examine the convergence and values for complex a, b, and c, even for real values of
the parameters, it is very difficult to relate all the possibilities for the convergence
and values of the continued fraction in an efficient manner. The sizes, signs, and
possible zero values for each parameter, a, b, and c, and the parity of n present
a large variety of cases that must be individually examined, yielding a variety of
results.
Theorem 2. Set
1 1 1 b 1 1
α := (3)
a + a + ··· + a + c + a + a + ···
and recall that µn is defined by (1).
Then, for any positive numbers a, b, and c,
sµ
µ ¶2
1 µn+1 µn+1
α= −c + (1 − b) + c + (1 + b) + 4b(−1)n µ2n+1 . (4)
2 µn µn
where we have employed (8) and again used the elementary recurrence relations
for a continued fraction’s numerator and denominator [1, p. 9, eq. (1.2.9)]. Solving
(9) for α, we find that
α2 νn+1 − (νn − bνn − cνn+1 )α − bνn−1 − cνn = 0. (10)
Solving (10) and taking the requisite positive root, we find that
p
(1 − b)νn − cνn+1 + ((1 − b)νn − cνn+1 )2 + 4νn+1 (bνn−1 + cνn )
α= . (11)
2νn+1
We now utilize another elementary relation for the numerators and denomi-
nators of continued fractions [1, p. 9, eq. (1.2.10)] and apply it to (8) to deduce
that
νn2 − νn+1 νn−1 = (−1)n−1 . (12)
Using the elementary relation (A + B)2 = (A − B)2 + 4AB and employing (12)
under the radical sign, we conclude that
sµ
¶2
1 νn νn 1
α = −c + (1 − b) + c + (1 + b) + 4b(−1)n 2 . (13)
2 νn+1 νn+1 νn+1
Since, by (6), νn = 1/µn , we see that (13) is the same as (4). The convergence
of (4) and its convergence to the given value follow from a general theorem on
periodic continued fractions found in Lorentzen and Waadeland’s book [1, p. 104,
Thm. 6]. This completes the proof.
Denote
δn := (1 + b)νn + cνn+1 .
Thus, by (15),
D = δn2 + 4b(−1)n .
Suppose first that abc 6= 0. Then, using the aforementioned theorem in [1], we
conclude that α converges to α1 in the following cases:
b>0 b <√
0
n even δn > √
0 δn > 2 −b
n odd δn > 2 b δn > 0
Moreover, α converges to α2 in the following cases:
b>0 b < 0√
n even δn < 0√ δn < −2 −b
n odd δn < −2 b δn < 0
We do not give any details but provide some examples as an illustration. If n
is odd, ac > 0, and −1 < b < 0, then α converges to α1 . Using (7), we can bound
νn from above and below in terms of Fibonacci numbers in various cases and then
give alternative criteria for convergence. If n is even, b, c > 0, and a < −1, then α
converges to α1 if
(1 + b)|a|n−1 Fn+1
< ,
c Fn
where Fj , j ≥ 0, denotes the jth Fibonacci number.
If abc = 0, then, as above, we must consider separately several cases. We state
one such result. Suppose that n is even, a = 0, c 6= 0, and c2 + 4b ≥ 0. Then the
continued fraction α converges to
√
−c + (sgn c) c2 + 4b
,
2
where (
+1, if c > 0,
sgn c =
−1, if c < 0.
Suppose that n is odd, a = 0, |b| > 1, and c 6= 0. Then the continued fraction α
converges to
c
.
b−1
Note that if b = 0, α trivially converges, since it terminates.
Lastly, note that there are cases when α does not converge, e.g., when a = c = 0
and b > 0, and when a = 0 and c2 + 4b < 0.
We are grateful to both referees for valuable suggestions, especially the referee
who advised us that we need to pay more attention to the convergence of (4).
262 B. C. Berndt and G. Choi AEM
References
[1] L. Lorentzen and H. Waadeland, Continued Fractions with Applications, North Hol-
land, Amsterdam, 1992.
[2] S. Ramanujan, The Lost Notebook and Other Unpublished Papers, Narosa, New Delhi,
1988.
Manuscript received: September 8, 2003 and, in final form, February 22, 2004.