Multiple recurrence and popular differences for polynomial patterns in rings of integers

Abstract We demonstrate that the phenomenon of popular differences (aka the phenomenon of large intersections) holds for natural families of polynomial patterns in rings of integers of number fields. If K is a number field with ring of integers $\mathcal{O}_K$ and $E \subseteq \mathcal{O}_K$ has positive upper Banach density $d^*(E) = \delta > 0$ , we show, inter alia : (1) if $p(x) \in K[x]$ is an intersective polynomial (i.e., p has a root modulo m for every $m \in \mathcal{O}_K$ ) with $p(\mathcal{O}_K) \subseteq \mathcal{O}_K$ and $r, s \in \mathcal{O}_K$ are distinct and nonzero, then for any $\varepsilon > 0$ , there is a syndetic set $S \subseteq \mathcal{O}_K$ such that for any $n \in S$ , \begin{align*} d^* \left( \left\{ x \in \mathcal{O}_K \;:\; \{x, x + rp(n), x + sp(n)\} \subseteq E \right\} \right) > \delta^3 - \varepsilon. \end{align*} Moreover, if ${s}/{r} \in \mathbb{Q}$ , then there are syndetically many $n \in \mathcal{O}_K$ such that \begin{align*} d^* \left( \left\{ x \in \mathcal{O}_K \;:\; \{x, x + rp(n), x + sp(n), x + (r+s)p(n)\} \subseteq E \right\} \right) > \delta^4 - \varepsilon; \end{align*} (2) if $\{p_1, \dots, p_k\} \subseteq K[x]$ is a jointly intersective family (i.e., $p_1, \dots, p_k$ have a common root modulo m for every $m \in \mathcal{O}_K$ ) of linearly independent polynomials with $p_i(\mathcal{O}_K) \subseteq \mathcal{O}_K$ , then there are syndetically many $n \in \mathcal{O}_K$ such that \begin{align*} d^* \left( \left\{ x \in \mathcal{O}_K \;:\; \{x, x + p_1(n), \dots, x + p_k(n)\} \subseteq E \right\} \right) > \delta^{k+1} - \varepsilon. \end{align*} These two results generalise and extend previous work of Frantzikinakis and Kra [ 21 ] and Franztikinakis [ 19 ] on polynomial configurations in $\mathbb{Z}$ and build upon recent work of the authors and Best [ 2 ] on linear patterns in general abelian groups. The above combinatorial results follow from multiple recurrence results in ergodic theory via a version of Furstenberg’s correspondence principle. The ergodic-theoretic recurrence theorems require a sharpening of existing tools for handling polynomial multiple ergodic averages. A key advancement made in this paper is a new result on the equidistribution of polynomial orbits in nilmanifolds, which can be seen as a far-reaching generalisation of Weyl’s equidistribution theorem for polynomials of several variables: (3) let $d, k, l \in \mathbb{N}$ . Let $(X, \mathcal{B}, \mu, T_1, \dots, T_l)$ be an ergodic, connected $\mathbb{Z}^l$ -nilsystem. Let $\{p_{i,j} \;:\; 1 \le i \le k, 1 \le j \le l\} \subseteq \mathbb{Q}[x_1, \dots, x_d]$ be a family of polynomials such that $p_{i,j}\left( \mathbb{Z}^d \right) \subseteq \mathbb{Z}$ and $\{1\} \cup \{p_{i,j}\}$ is linearly independent over $\mathbb{Q}$ . Then the $\mathbb{Z}^d$ -sequence $\left( \prod_{j=1}^l{T_j^{p_{1,j}(n)}}x, \dots, \prod_{j=1}^l{T_j^{p_{k,j}(n)}}x \right)_{n \in \mathbb{Z}^d}$ is well-distributed in $X^k$ for every x in a co-meager set of full measure.