English

The unit equation has no solutions in number fields of degree prime to $3$ where $3$ splits completely

Number Theory 2020-04-08 v2 Algebraic Geometry

Abstract

Let KK be a number field with ring of integers OK\mathcal O_{K}. We prove that if 33 does not divide [K:Q] [K:\mathbb Q] and 33 splits completely in KK, then the unit equation has no solutions in KK. In other words, there are no x,yOK×x, y \in \mathcal O_{K}^{\times} with x+y=1x + y = 1. Our elementary pp-adic proof is inspired by the Skolem-Chabauty-Coleman method applied to the restriction of scalars of the projective line minus three points. Applying this result to a problem in arithmetic dynamics, we show that if fOK[x]f \in \mathcal O_{K}[x] has a finite cyclic orbit in OK\mathcal O_{K} of length nn then n{1,2,4}n \in \{1, 2, 4\}.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2003.02414,
  title  = {The unit equation has no solutions in number fields of degree prime to $3$ where $3$ splits completely},
  author = {Nicholas Triantafillou},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2003.02414},
  year   = {2020}
}

Comments

4 pages, comments appreciated. Update corrects typos and adds an application