Open Diophantine Problems

We collect a number of open questions concerning Diophantine equations, Diophantine Approximation and transcendental numbers. Revised version: corrected typos and added references.Comment: 58 pages. to appear in the Moscow Mathematical Journal vo. 4 N.1 (2004) dedicated to Pierre Cartie

On the pp-adic closure of a subgroup of rational points on an Abelian variety

In 2007, B. Poonen (unpublished) studied the $p$--adic closure of a subgroup of rational points on a commutative algebraic group. More recently, J. Bella\"iche asked the same question for the special case of Abelian varieties. These problems are $p$--adic analogues of a question raised earlier by B. Mazur on the density of rational points for the real topology. For a simple Abelian variety over the field of rational numbers, we show that the actual $p$--adic rank is at least the third of the expected value

Report on some recent advances in Diophantine approximation

A basic question of Diophantine approximation, which is the first issue we discuss, is to investigate the rational approximations to a single real number. Next, we consider the algebraic or polynomial approximations to a single complex number, as well as the simultaneous approximation of powers of a real number by rational numbers with the same denominator. Finally we study generalisations of these questions to higher dimensions. Several recent advances have been made by B. Adamczewski, Y. Bugeaud, S. Fischler, M. Laurent, T. Rivoal, D. Roy and W.M. Schmidt, among others. We review some of these works.Comment: to be published by Springer Verlag, Special volume in honor of Serge Lang, ed. Dorian Goldfeld, Jay Jorgensen, Dinakar Ramakrishnan, Ken Ribet and John Tat

Approximation of an algebraic number by products of rational numbers and units

We relate a previous result of ours on families of Diophantine equations having only trivial solutions with a result on the approximation of an algebraic number by products of rational numbers and units. We compare this approximation with a Liouville type estimate, and with an estimate arising from a lower bound for a linear combination of logarithms

A family of Thue equations involving powers of units of the simplest cubic fields

E. Thomas was one of the first to solve an infinite family of Thue equations, when he considered the forms $F_n(X, Y )= X^3 -(n-1)X^2Y -(n+2)XY^2 -Y^3$ and the family of equations $F_n(X, Y )=\pm 1$, $n\in {\mathbf N}$. This family is associated to the family of the simplest cubic fields ${\mathbf Q}(\lambda)$ of D. Shanks, $\lambda$ being a root of $F_n(X,1)$. We introduce in this family a second parameter by replacing the roots of the minimal polynomial $F_n(X, 1)$ of $\lambda$ by the $a$-th powers of the roots and we effectively solve the family of Thue equations that we obtain and which depends now on the two parameters $n$ and $a$.Comment: Expanded version (31p) of a paper to appear in the Journal de Th\'eorie des Nombres de Bordeau

Diophantine approximation by conjugate algebraic integers

Building on work of Davenport and Schmidt, we mainly prove two results. The first one is a version of Gel'fond's transcendence criterion which provides a sufficient condition for a complex or $p$-adic number $\xi$ to be algebraic in terms of the existence of polynomials of bounded degree taking small values at $\xi$ together with most of their derivatives. The second one, which follows from this criterion by an argument of duality, is a result of simultaneous approximation by conjugate algebraic integers for a fixed number $\xi$ that is either transcendental or algebraic of sufficiently large degree. We also present several constructions showing that these results are essentially optimal.Comment: The section 4 of this new version has been rewritten to simplify the proof of the main result. Other results in Sections 9 and 10 have been improved. To appear in Compositio Mat