The modulo-three conjecture for all-heads coin sequences

Let a coin sequence be a finite string of 00's and 11's, where 11 denotes a heads-up coin, and say that a sequence is removable if all its coins can be removed under the linear arrangement with no gaps. For a positive integer nn, write 1n1^n for the sequence consisting of nn heads-up coins.

Modulo-three conjecture. The sequence 1n1^n is removable if and only if

n0 or 1(mod3).n\equiv 0\text{ or }1\pmod{3}.

The conjecture is motivated by the initial removable and non-removable examples, and is used to predict removability after reducing a general sequence to an all-heads sequence. The supplied text gives no resolution, so the conjecture remains open in this source.

Sources & referencesView supporting material

Primary source

Kennan Shelton and Michael Siler, “Variations of a Coin-Removal Problem”, arXiv:math/0411052 (2004).

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