MathDB
A combinatorics problem with palindromic sequences

Source: The francophone mathematical olympiads P2

June 29, 2020
combinatoricsinductionSequenceFrancophone

Problem Statement

Let a1,a2,,ana_1,a_2,\ldots,a_n be a finite sequence of non negative integers, its subsequences are the sequences of the form ai,ai+1,,aja_i,a_{i+1},\ldots,a_j with 1ijn1\le i\le j \le n. Two subsequences are said to be equal if they have the same length and have the same terms, that is, two subsequences ai,ai+1,,aja_i,a_{i+1},\ldots,a_j and au,au+1,ava_u,a_{u+1},\ldots a_v are equal iff ji=uvj-i=u-v and ai+k=au+ka_{i+k}=a_{u+k} forall integers kk such that 0kj10\le k\le j-1. Finally, we say that a subsequence ai,ai+1,,aja_i,a_{i+1},\ldots,a_j is palindromic if ai+k=ajka_{i+k}=a_{j-k} forall integers kk such that 0kji0\le k \le j-i What is the greatest number of different palindromic subsequences that can a palindromic sequence of length nn contain?