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Problem 6

Posted 04/02/2015 and updated 06/19/2015
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This problem is proposed by Ran Pan. If you want to submit your problem, please click here.

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This problem is derived from the previous problem, Problem 5. In this problem, we consider the set of all the binary square matrices of size $n\times n$, denoted by $\mathcal B_{n,n}$. Suppose $M\in\mathcal B_{n,n}$ and $P\in \mathcal B_{2,2}$, we define $mch(P,M)$ as the number of occurences of $P$ as blocks in $M$. If $mch(P,M)=0$, we say $M$ avoids $P$.

For example, $P=\begin{pmatrix}1&1\\1&1\end{pmatrix}\in \mathcal B_{2,2}$ and $M=\begin{pmatrix}0&0&1&1\\1&0&1&1\\1&1&1&1\\1&1&1&0\end{pmatrix}\in \mathcal B_{4,4}$.

We see $mch(P,M)=4$. Note that occurences could be overlapped. In this example, there are two occurences in the third and fourth column.

$a(n)$ is the number of elements in $\mathcal B_{n,n}$ avoiding $P=\begin{pmatrix}0&1\\1&1\end{pmatrix}$.

For example, $a(1)=2$, $a(2)=15$.

Find $a(n)$.



A more general question is as follows,

$m(n,k)$ is the number of elements in $\mathcal B_{n,n}$ having exact $k$ occurences of $P$, where $P$ could be any matrix in $\mathcal B_{2,2}$. It's easy to see $m(n,0)=a(n)$.

Find $m(n,k)$ or the generating function of $m(n,k)$.

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Updated 06/19/2015 by Brian Miceli

One possible idea is to develop some approach like two-dimensional Goulden-Jackson cluster method.

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