Abstract:
We shall consider monotonicity in the “horizontal direction” for several
well known functions f(s)f(s) of the complex variable s=σ+its=σ+it,
where monotonicity here means |f(s)||f(s)| is monotone increasing or monotone
decreasing as σσ increases. The first function will be the well known
gamma function Γ(s)Γ(s), and it will be shown that |Γ(s)||Γ(s)| is
monotone increasing in σσ once one is a small distance away from
the real axis, more precisely for |t|>5/4|t|>5/4. A similar result will be
shown for the Riemann zeta function ζ(s)ζ(s) as well as the two related
functions η(s)η(s) (the Euler–Dedekind eta function) and ξ(s)ξ(s) (the
Riemann ξξ function). Here it will be shown that all three have monotone
decreasing modulus for σ<0σ<0 and |t|>8|t|>8, and that for any of
the three functions the extension of this monotonicity result to
σ<1/2σ<1/2 is equivalent to the Riemann Hypothesis. An inequality relating the
monotonicity of all three functions will be given.