Let $H$ be a Krull monoid with finite class group $G$ and suppose that each class contains a prime divisor (rings of integers in algebraic number fields share this property). For each element $a \in H$, its set of lengths $\mathsf L(a)$ consists of all $k \in \mathbb{N} _0$ such that $a$ can be written as a product of $k$ irreducible elements. Sets of lengths of $H$ are finite nonempty subsets of the positive integers, and we consider the system $\mathcal L (H) = \{ \mathsf L (a) \mid a \in H \}$ of all sets of lengths. It is classical that H is factorial if and only if $|G| = 1$, and that $|G| \le 2$ if and only if $|L| = 1$ for each $L \in \mathcal L(H)$ (Carlitz, 1960).

Suppose that $|G| \ge 3$. Then there is an $a \in H$ with $|\mathsf L (a)|>1$, the $m$-fold sumset $\mathsf L(a) + \ldots +\mathsf L(a)$ is contained in $\mathsf L(a^m)$, and hence $|\mathsf L(a^m)| > m$ for every $m \in \mathbb{N}$. The monoid $\mathcal B (G)$ of zero-sum sequences over $G$ is again a Krull monoid of the above type. It is easy to see that $\mathcal L (H) = \mathcal L \big(\mathcal B (G) \big)$, and it is usual to set $\mathcal L (G) := \mathcal L \big( \mathcal B (G) \big)$. In particular, the system of sets of lengths of $H$ depends only on $G$, and it can be studied with methods from additive combinatorics.
The present talk is devoted to the inverse problem whether or not the class group $G$ is determined by the system of sets of lengths. In more technical terms, let $G'$ be a finite abelian group with $|G'| \ge 4$ and $\mathcal L(G) = \mathcal L(G')$. Does it follow that $G$ and $G'$ are isomorphic ?
The answer is positive for groups $G$ having rank at most two $[1]$ and for groups of the form $G = C_{n}^{r}$ with $r \le (n+2)/6$ $[2]$. The proof is based on the characterization of minimal zero-sum sequences of maximal length over groups of rank two, and on the set $\triangle^*(G)$ of minimal distances of $G$ (the latter has been studied by Hamidoune, Plagne, Schmid, and others ; see the talk by Q. Zhong).[-]

The Chowla conjecture asserts that the signs of the Liouville function are distributed randomly on the integers. Reinterpreted in the language of ergodic theory this conjecture asserts that the Liouville dynamical system is a Bernoulli system. We prove that ergodicity of the Liouville system implies the Chowla conjecture. Our argument has an ergodic flavor and combines recent results in analytic number theory, finitistic and infinitary decomposition results involving uniformity norms, and equidistribution results on nilmanifolds.[-]

The Liouville function $\lambda(n)$ takes the value +1 or -1 depending on whether $n$ has an even or an odd number of prime factors. The Liouville function is closely related to the characteristic function of the primes and is believed to behave more-or-less randomly.
I will discuss my very recent work with Radziwill, Tao, Teräväinen, and Ziegler, where we show that, in almost all intervals of length $X^{\varepsilon}$, the Liouville function does not correlate with polynomial phases or more generally with nilsequences.
I will also discuss applications to superpolynomial number of sign patterns for the Liouville sequence and to a new averaged version of Chowla's conjecture.[-]

Discussing recent work joint with M. Rudnev [2], I will discuss the modern approach to the sum-product problem in the reals. Our approach builds upon and simplifies the arguments of Shkredov and Konyagin [1], and in doing so yields a new best result towards the problem. We prove that
$max(\left | A+A \right |,\left | A+A \right |)\geq \left | A \right |^{\frac{4}{3}+\frac{2}{1167}-o^{(1)}}$ , for a finite $A\subset \mathbb{R}$. At the heart of our argument are quantitative forms of the two slogans ‘multiplicative structure of a set gives additive information', and ‘every set has a multiplicatively structured subset'.[-]

Zaremba's conjecture belongs to the area of continued fractions. It predicts that for any given positive integer q there is a positive a, a < q, (a,q)=1 such that all partial quotients b_j in its continued fractions expansion a/q = 1/b_1+1/b_2 +... + 1/b_s are bounded by five. At the moment the question is widely open although the area has a rich history of works by Korobov, Hensley, Niederreiter, Bourgain and many others. We survey certain results concerning this hypothesis and show how growth in groups helps to solve different relaxations of Zaremba's conjecture. In particular, we show that a deeper hypothesis of Hensley concerning some Cantor-type set with the Hausdorff dimension >1/2 takes place for the so-called modular form of Zaremba's conjecture.[-]

Roth's theorem states that a subset $A$ of $\{1, \ldots, N\}$ of positive density contains a positive $N^2$-proportion of (non-trivial) three arithmetic progressions, given by pairs $(a, d)$ with $d \neq 0$ such that $a, a+d, a+2 d$ all lie in $A$. In recent breakthrough work by Kelley and Meka, the known bounds have been improved drastically. One of the core ingredients of the their proof is a version of the almost periodicity result due to Croot and Sisask. The latter has been obtained in a non-quantitative form by Conant and Pillay for amenable groups using continuous logic.
In joint work with Daniel Palacín, we will present a model-theoretic version (in classical first-order logic) of the almost-periodicity result for a general group equipped with a Keisler measure under some mild assumptions and show how to use this result to obtain a non-quantitative proof of Roth's result. One of the main ideas of the proof is an adaptation of a result of Pillay, Scanlon and Wagner on the behaviour of generic types in a definable group in a simple theory.[-]

We give an arithmetic version of Tao's algebraic regularity lemma (which was itself an improved Szemerédi regularity lemma for graphs uniformly definable in finite fields). In the arithmetic regime the objects of study are pairs $(G, D)$ where $G$ is a group and $D$ an arbitrary subset, all uniformly definable in finite fields. We obtain optimal results, namely that the algebraic regularity lemma holds for the associated bipartite graph $(G, G, E)$ where $E(x, y)$ is $x y^{-1} \in D$, witnessed by a the decomposition of $G$ into cosets of a uniformly definable small index normal subgroup $H$ of $G$.[-]