Relation of the Cyclotomic Equation with the Harmonic and Derived Series

摘要

We associate some (old) convergent series related to definite integrals with the cyclotomic equation x ^m − 1 = 0, for several natural numbers m; for example, for m = 3, x ³ − 1 = (x − 1)(1 + x + x ²) leads to ∫01dx(1/(1+x+x2))=π/(33)=(1-1/2)+(1/4-1/5)+(1/7-1/8)+⋯. In some cases, we express the results in terms of the Dirichlet characters. Generalizations for arbitrary m are well defined but do imply integrals and/or series summations rather involved.