Popular Differences for Corners in Abelian Groups

Abstract

For a compact abelian group $G$, a corner in $G \times G$ is a triple of points $(x,y)$, $(x,y+d)$, $(x+d,y)$. The classical corners theorem of Ajtai and Szemer\'edi implies that for every $\alpha > 0$, there is some $\delta > 0$ such that every subset $A \subset G \times G$ of density $\alpha$ contains a $\delta$ fraction of all corners in $G \times G$, as $x,y,d$ range over $G$. Recently, Mandache proved a "popular differences" version of this result in the finite field case $G = \mathbb F_p^n$, showing that for any subset $A \subset G \times G$ of density $\alpha$, one can fix $d \neq 0$ such that $A$ contains a large fraction, now known to be approximately $\alpha^4$, of all corners with difference $d$, as $x,y$ vary over $G$. We generalize Mandache's result to all compact abelian groups $G$, as well as the case of corners in $\mathbb Z^2$.