Poisson distribution conjecture for six-packs of consecutive pth powers

For each prime pp, let fpf_p be the polynomial defined in the paper, and let ρ(m)\rho(m) be the relative density of primes pp for which fpf_p has exactly mm roots; equivalently, there are exactly mm pairs of consecutive ppth powers modulo p2p^2. Six-pack distribution conjecture. For every k0k\ge0,

ρ(6k+2)=12e1/6k!6kandρ(6k+4)=12e1/6k!6k,\rho(6k+2)=\frac{1}{2e^{-1/6}k!6^k}\quad\text{and}\quad\rho(6k+4)=\frac{1}{2e^{-1/6}k!6^k},

while ρ(m)=0\rho(m)=0 for all m≢2,4(mod6)m\not\equiv2,4\pmod 6. In particular, the relative densities of P~cons\tilde{\mathcal P}_{cons} and Pcons{\mathcal P}_{cons} are respectively 1e1/60.1535181-e^{-1/6}\approx0.153518 and 112e1/60.5767591-\frac12e^{-1/6}\approx0.576759. This conjecture formalizes the heuristic that the number of nontrivial six-packs follows a Poisson distribution with parameter 1/61/6, together with the distribution of primes modulo 66; it is not proved in the paper.

Sources & referencesView supporting material

Primary source

David W. Boyd, Greg Martin and Mark Thom, “Squarefree values of trinomial discriminants”, arXiv:1402.5148 (2014).

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