Prime products – new pattern

number theory

Let $p_1, p_2, p_3,…,p_k$ be all prime numbers less than $n$ (ie $\pi(n)=k$).

Then count of numbers less than $n$ obtained by choosing and multiplying $p_i$'s from above without repetition is approx 60%.

More formally, if $\pi_i(n)$ denotes count of numbers less than $n$, which are product of exactly $i$ prime numbers (that is of the form $p_xp_y…p_z$), then:

$\pi_1(n) + \pi_2(n) + … + \pi_k(n) \approx 60\%*n \approx 6n/\pi^2$

Note that by definition $\pi_1(n)$ is count of primes = $\pi(n)$, $\pi_2(n)$ is count of integers of the form $p_xp_y$, $\pi_3(n)$ is count of integers of the form $p_xp_yp_z$ less than $n$. And so on till $\pi_k(n)$.

Does this look similar to an already proven theorem or conjecture with prime products?

UPDATE 8/14/21
Based on further discussion, set of prime products less than $n$ mentioned above is same as set of all square-free numbers less than $n$ (sequence A005117). Thus all results for square-free numbers apply here.

Best Answer

You are counting the squarefree numbers up to $n$ other than $1$. If you include $1$ in the sum, you get the sequence A013928, which includes a reference to a 2007 paper by Cohen, Dress, and El Marraki in which they prove (in your notation) that

$$|(1+\pi_1(n)+\pi_2(n)+\cdots+\pi_k(n)) - 6n/\pi^2| < 0.02767\sqrt n\text{ for }n\ge 438653$$