Generalized Riemann hypothesis, time series and normal distributions**Dedicated to Giorgio Parisi on the occasion of his 70th birthday.

Abstract

L functions based on Dirichlet characters are natural generalizations of the Riemann function: they both have series representations and satisfy an Euler product representation, i.e. an infinite product taken over prime numbers. In this paper we address the generalized Riemann hypothesis relative to the non-trivial complex zeros of the Dirichlet L functions by studying the possibility to enlarge the original domain of convergence of their Euler product. The feasibility of this analytic continuation is ruled by the asymptotic behavior in N of the series involving Dirichlet characters modulo q on primes pn. Although deterministic, these series have pronounced stochastic features which make them analogous to random time series. We show that the BN’s satisfy various normal law probability distributions. The study of their large asymptotic behavior poses an interesting problem of statistical physics equivalent to the single Brownian trajectory problem, here addressed by defining an appropriate ensemble involving intervals of primes. For non-principal characters, we show that the series BN present a universal diffusive random walk behavior in view of the Dirichlet theorem on the equidistribution of reduced residue classes modulo q and the Lemke Oliver–Soundararajan conjecture on the distribution of pairs of residues on consecutive primes. This purely diffusive behavior of BN implies that the domain of convergence of the infinite product representation of the Dirichlet L-functions for non-principal characters can be extended from down to , without encountering any zeros before reaching this critical line.