Common divisors of \(a^n-1\) and \(b^n-1\) over function fields (Q1774327)

Recently, \textit{Y. Bugeaud, P. Corvaja} and \textit{U. Zannier} [Math. Z. 243, 79--84 (2003; Zbl 1021.11001)] proved that if \(a,b\) are two multiplicatively independent positive integers, then for every \(\epsilon >0\) there is an \(n_0=n_0(a,b,\epsilon )\) such that \(\log(\gcd(a^n-1,b^n-1))\leq \epsilon n\). \textit{N. Ailon} and \textit{Z. Rudnick} [Acta Arith. 113, 31--38 (2004; Zbl 1057.11018)] proved a stronger result for polynomials with complex coefficients. More precisely, they showed that if \(a,b\) are multiplicatively independent polynomials in \({\mathbb C}[T]\) then there is a constant \(C(a,b)>0\) such that \(\text{deg}(\gcd(a^n-1,b^n-1))\leq C(a,b)\) for all \(n\geq 1\). The author shows that there is no such result for polynomials \(a,b\) with coefficients in a finite field. More precisely, he shows the following: let \(a(T),b(T)\) be monic polynomials with coefficients in a finite field \({\mathbb F}_q\). Then for every positive integer \(k\) there is a constant \(c=c(a,b,q^k)>0\) such that each residue class modulo \(q^k\) contains infinitely many positive integers \(n\) with \(\text{deg}( \gcd(a^n-1,b^n-1))\geq cn\). The proof uses the analogues for \({\mathbb F}_q[T]\) of the prime number theorem for arithmetic progressions, as well as the \(r\)-th power reciprocity law for integers \(r\) dividing \(q-1\).