Equal values of certain partition functions via Diophantine equations (Q2065742)

Let \(P_A(n)\) denote the number of partitions of an integer \(n\) into parts from the set \(A \in \mathbb{N_+}\), where \(\mathbb{N_+}\) represents the set of positive integers. In this paper, the authors investigate the existence of integer solutions of Diophantine equations involving \(P_A(x)\), particularly of the form \(P_A(x)=P_B(x)\), where \(A\) and \(B\) are certain finite sets. More precisely, they firstly prove that the Diophantine equation \(P_A(x) = f (y)\) has infinitely many solutions in positive integers for each polynomial \(f \in \mathbb{Z}[x]\) with positive degree and positive leading coefficient with \(A \in \{a_1, a_2\} \subset \mathbb{N_+}\) such that \(\gcd(a_1,a_2)=1\). Also, they study the solutions of the equation \(P_3(x)=P_n(y)\) for \(n=4, 5\). They prove that the equation \(P_3(x)=P_4(y)\) has infinitely many solutions in integers and the equation \(P_3(x)=P_5(y)\) has a finite number of solutions represented by \begin{align*} &(x,y)\in\{(1,1),(2,2),(3,3),(5,4),(6,5),(8,6),(16,10),(18,11),(26,14)\\ & (45,20),(174,45),(217,51),(457,77),(468,78),(701,97),(10093,388)\}. \end{align*} Furthermore, they obtain a general result concerning the existence of infinitely many positive integer solutions of the equation \(P_A(x)=P_4(y)\), where \(A \in \{1,2,a\}, a \in \mathbb{N}_{\geq 3}\), and under weak assumptions on \(a,b \in \mathbb{N}_{\geq 3}\) with \(a \neq b\) and \(A \in \{1,2,a\}\), \(B \in \{1,2,b\}\) they also show that the Diophantine equation \(P_A(x) = P_B(y)\) has infinitely many solutions in positive integers. In fact, the authors also obtain several results concerning the square values of \(P_A(x)\), particularly they describe the set of positive integer solutions of the equation \(y^2 = P_n(x)\) for \(n =3, 4, 5\). More precisely, they prove that this equation has infinitely many solutions in case of \(n=3, 4\), and it only has solutions \((x, y) = (1, 1), (2027, 77129)\) if \(n=5\). Finally, they give some general questions and conjectures concerning various aspects of the Diophantine equations of the form \( P_A(x) = P_B(y)\) such as \begin{itemize} \item Let \(A, B \subset \mathbb{N_+}\). If the Diophantine equation \(P_A(x) =P_B(y)\) has infinitely many (non-trivial) solutions in positive integers. How large the number \(\min \{\# A, \# B\}\) can be? \item Let \(A, B \subset \mathbb{N_+}\). Does there exist combinatorial conditions on \(A\) and \(B\) which guarantees the non-existence (or finiteness) of integral solutions of the Diophantine equation \(P_A(x) = P_B(y)\)? \item Let \(A, B \in \mathbb{N_+}\). If \((m, n) = (3, 4)\) and \(3 \leq m \leq n\), then the Diophantine equation \(P_m(x) = P_n(y)\) has only finitely many solutions in non-negative integers. \end{itemize} Furthermore, the authors remark several other problems, conjectures and questions related to the solutions of equations of the form \(P_A(x) =P_B(y)\) .