English

Handling a large bound for a problem on the generalized Pillai equation $\pm r a^x \pm s b^y = c$

Number Theory 2011-12-21 v1

Abstract

We consider NN, the number of solutions (x,y,u,v)(x,y,u,v) to the equation (1)urax+(1)vsby=c (-1)^u r a^x + (-1)^v s b^y = c in nonnegative integers x,yx, y and integers u,v{0,1}u, v \in \{0,1\}, for given integers a>1a>1, b>1b>1, c>0c>0, r>0r>0 and s>0s>0. Previous work showed that there are nine essentially distinct (a,b,c,r,s)(a,b,c,r,s) for which N4N \ge 4, except possibly for cases in which the solutions have rr, aa, xx, ss, bb, and yy each bounded by 810148 \cdot 10^{14} or 210152 \cdot 10^{15}. In this paper we show that there are no further cases with N4N \ge 4 within these bounds. We note that N=3N = 3 for an infinite number of (a,b,c,r,s)(a,b,c,r,s), even if we eliminate from consideration cases which are directly derived from other cases in one of several completely designated ways. Our work differs from previous work in that we allow xx and yy to be zero and also allow choices of (u,v)(u,v) other than (0,1)(0,1).

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1112.4547,
  title  = {Handling a large bound for a problem on the generalized Pillai equation $\pm r a^x \pm s b^y = c$},
  author = {Reese Scott and Robert Styer},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1112.4547},
  year   = {2011}
}