On concatenations of two Padovan and Perrin numbers (Q6092105)

Let \( (P_k)_{k\ge 0} \) and \( (R_k)_{k\ge 0} \) be the sequences of Padovan and Perrin numbers defined by the respective linear recurrence relations: \( P_0=0 \), \( P_1=P_2=1 \); \( P_k=P_{k-2}+P_{k-3} \) and \( R_0=3 \), \( R_1=0 \), \( R_2=2 \); \( R_k=R_{k-2}+R_{k-3} \), for \( k\ge 3 \). In the paper under review, the author studies the Diophantine equations \[ P_k=\overline{P_mP_n}=10^{d}P_m+P_n\tag{1} \] and \[ R_k=\overline{R_mR_n}=10^{d}R_m+R_n,\tag{2} \] where \( d \) is the number of digits of \( P_n \) and \( R_n \), respectively. The main results of the author are the following. Theorem 1. Let \( d \) denotes the number of digits of \( P_n \). The only solutions to the Diophantine equation (1) in nonnegative integers \( (k,m,n,d) \) with \( k\ge 11 \), \( m\ge 3 \), \( n\ge 0 \), and \( d\ge 1 \) are \begin{align*} (k,m,n,d)\in \{(11,3,5,1), (13,5,3,1), (15,6,9,1), (16,7,10,1), (22,5,17,2), (24,7,17,2)\}. \end{align*} Theorem 2. Let \( d \) denotes the number of digits of \( R_n \). The only solution to the Diophantine equation (2) in nonnegative integers \( (k,m,n,d) \) with \( k\ge 8 \), \( m\ge 3 \), \( n,d\ge 1 \), and \( n\ne 2 \) are \[ (k,m,n,d)\in \{(11,4,4,1)\}. \] To prove Theorem 1 and Theorem 2, the author uses a clever combination of techniques in Diophantine number theory, the usual properties of the Padovan and Perrin sequences, Baker's theory of non-zero lower bounds for linear forms in logarithms of algebraic numbers, and reduction techniques involving the theory of continued fractions. All numerical computations are done with the aid of simple computer programs in \texttt{Mathematica}.