Hua's theorem on prime squares in short intervals (Q5925959)

The subject of this paper is essentailly to establish an asymptotic formula for the number of representations of a natural number as the sum of five squares of almost equal primes. Let \(\Lambda(n)\) denote the von Mangoldt function, and define \[ R(N,U)=\sum\Lambda(n_1)\Lambda(n_2)\Lambda(n_3)\Lambda(n_4)\Lambda(n_5), \] where the summation is taken over the natural numbers \(n_i\) satisfying \(N=n_1^2+\cdots+n_5^2\) and \(|n_i-\sqrt{N/5}|\leq U\) \((1\leq i\leq 5)\). Then as far as \(U\) is not too small, one may expect that the asymptotic formula of the form \[ R(N,U)=(115/24)\sqrt{5}S(N)U^4 N^{-1/2}\{1+O((\log N)^{-1})\} \] would hold, where \(S(N)\) is the `singular series' of this problem, and one has \(S(N)\gg 1\) when \(N\equiv 5\) (mod 24). If the latter formula were proved, then it would immediately follow that every sufficiently large integer \(N\equiv 5\) (mod 24) may be written as the sum of five squares of primes \(p_1,\dots,p_5\) satisfying \(|p_i-\sqrt{N/5}|\leq U\) for all \(i\). This is a refinement of a theorem due to Hua. In this paper, the authors prove the above asymptotic formula for \(U=N^{11/23+\varepsilon}\) with any fixed positive \(\varepsilon\), improving their previous result for \(U=N^{12/25+\varepsilon}\) [Sci. China, Ser. A 41, 710--722 (1998; Zbl 0938.11048)]. To be short, this improvement is achieved by incorporating the method of \textit{T. Zhan} [Acta Math. Sin., New Ser. 7, 259--272 (1991; Zbl 0742.11048)] into their previous work. Under the generalized Riemann hypothesis for Dirichlet \(L\)-functions, on the other hand, they had proved the above formula for \(U=N^{9/20+\varepsilon}\) in 1996.