The unit equation and the cluster principle (Q4345819)

Let \(k\) be a number field of degree \(d\), let \(\Gamma\) be a finitely generated subgroup of rank \(s\) of \((k^*)^2\), and \(a_1,a_2\in k^*\). Consider the unit equation \[ a_1x_1+a_2x_2 (x_1,x_2\in \Gamma). \] The main result of the paper is that the above equation has at most \(d^{9s}c^{s^2}\) solutions for some absolute constant \(c\) (e.g. \(c=e^{86}\) is suitable). What is perhaps still more important, in order to prove this result the authors develop a method called \textit{cluster principle}, which is extendable to other situations as well. The idea is to show that the solutions of the equation up to height \(H\) can be subdivided into a bounded number of subsets (the bound depending only on \(s\)), such that after rescaling each subset by an element of \(\Gamma\), the rescaled subset has height proportional to \(\log H\). Therefore these subsets are considered as clusters of solutions of the equation.