Real zeros of random cosine polynomials with palindromic blocks of coefficients

Abstract

It is well known that a random cosine polynomial $ V_n(x) = \sum_ {j=0} ^{n} a_j \cos (j x) , \ x \in (0,2 \pi) $, with the coefficients being independent and identically distributed (i.i.d.) real-valued standard Gaussian random variables (asymptotically) has $ 2n / \sqrt{3} $ expected real roots. On the other hand, out of many ways to construct a dependent random polynomial, one is to force the coefficients to be palindromic. Hence, it makes sense to ask how many real zeros a random cosine polynomial (of degree $ n $) with identically and normally distributed coefficients possesses if the coefficients are sorted in palindromic blocks of a fixed length $ \ell. $ In this paper, we show that the asymptotics of the expected number of real roots of such a polynomial is $ \mathrm{K}_\ell \cdot 2n / \sqrt{3} $, where the constant $ \mathrm{K}_\ell $ (depending only on $ \ell $) is greater than 1, and can be explicitly represented by a double integral formula. That is to say, such polynomials have slightly more expected real zeros compared with the classical case with i.i.d. coefficients.