Given a function f on F₂ⁿ, we study the following problem. What is the largest affine subspace 𝒰 such that when restricted to 𝒰, all the non-trivial Fourier coefficients of f are very small? For the natural class of bounded Fourier degree d functions f: F₂ⁿ → [-1,1], we show that there exists an affine subspace of dimension at least Ω(n^{1/d!} k^{-2}), wherein all of f’s nontrivial Fourier coefficients become smaller than 2^{-k}. To complement this result, we show the existence of degree d functions with coefficients larger than 2^{-d log n} when restricted to any affine subspace of dimension larger than Ω(d n^{1/(d-1)}). In addition, we give explicit examples of functions with analogous but weaker properties. Along the way, we provide multiple characterizations of the Fourier coefficients of functions restricted to subspaces of F₂ⁿ that may be useful in other contexts. Finally, we highlight applications and connections of our results to parity kill number and affine dispersers.
@InProceedings{iyer_et_al:LIPIcs.ICALP.2023.83, author = {Iyer, Siddharth and Whitmeyer, Michael}, title = {{Searching for Regularity in Bounded Functions}}, booktitle = {50th International Colloquium on Automata, Languages, and Programming (ICALP 2023)}, pages = {83:1--83:20}, series = {Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics (LIPIcs)}, ISBN = {978-3-95977-278-5}, ISSN = {1868-8969}, year = {2023}, volume = {261}, editor = {Etessami, Kousha and Feige, Uriel and Puppis, Gabriele}, publisher = {Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum f{\"u}r Informatik}, address = {Dagstuhl, Germany}, URL = {https://drops.dagstuhl.de/entities/document/10.4230/LIPIcs.ICALP.2023.83}, URN = {urn:nbn:de:0030-drops-181351}, doi = {10.4230/LIPIcs.ICALP.2023.83}, annote = {Keywords: regularity, bounded function, Boolean function, Fourier analysis} }
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