In mathematics, the Riemann xi function is a variant of the Riemann zeta function, and is defined so as to have a particularly simple functional equation. The function is named in honour of Bernhard Riemann.

Riemann xi function in the complex plane. The color of a point encodes the value of the function. Darker colors denote values closer to zero and hue encodes the value's argument.

Definition

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Riemann's original lower-case "xi"-function,   was renamed with a   (Greek uppercase letter "xi") by Edmund Landau. Landau's   (lower-case "xi") is defined as[1]

 

for  . Here   denotes the Riemann zeta function and   is the gamma function.

The functional equation (or reflection formula) for Landau's   is

 

Riemann's original function, renamed as the upper-case   by Landau,[1] satisfies

 

and obeys the functional equation

 

Both functions are entire and purely real for real arguments.

Values

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The general form for positive even integers is

 

where   denotes the  th Bernoulli number. For example:

 

Series representations

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The   function has the series expansion

 

where

 

where the sum extends over  , the non-trivial zeros of the zeta function, in order of  .

This expansion plays a particularly important role in Li's criterion, which states that the Riemann hypothesis is equivalent to having   for all positive  .

Hadamard product

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A simple infinite product expansion is

 

where   ranges over the roots of  .

To ensure convergence in the expansion, the product should be taken over "matching pairs" of zeroes, i.e., the factors for a pair of zeroes of the form   and   should be grouped together.

References

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  1. ^ a b Landau, Edmund (1974) [1909]. Handbuch der Lehre von der Verteilung der Primzahlen [Handbook of the Study of Distribution of the Prime Numbers] (Third ed.). New York: Chelsea. §70-71 and page 894.

This article incorporates material from Riemann Ξ function on PlanetMath, which is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.