The distribution of power residues in finite fields (Q1377372)

Let \(p\) be a prime and \(N=N (\varepsilon_1, \varepsilon_2, \dots, \varepsilon_n)\) represent the number of elements \(x=0,1, \dots, p-n-1\) with the property that the Legendre symbol takes the value \(\varepsilon_i\) at \(x+i\) for \(1\leq i\leq n\). The authors show that \[ N= p/2^n+ O(n\sqrt p), \] for a certain absolute implied constant. They obtain variants where the \(\varepsilon_i\) are taken to be values of an \(r\)th order character in a finite field \(\mathbb{F}_q\), the \(x+i\) are replaced by monic polynomials \(P_i(x)\) and a short interval variant. The method of proof goes back to Davenport, who expressed \(N\) as a linear combination of full character sums and a small error term. The proofs are then completed using the Weil estimates, or in case of the short interval variant, estimates for incomplete exponential sums with polynomial arguments.