Some special equations on a finite field (Q767146)

Let \(N = N(a_1,\ldots,a_r)\) denote the number of solutions of \(a_1 x_1^{m_1} + \ldots + a_r x_r^{m_r}=c\) in the finite field \(\mathrm{GF}(q)\), \(q = p^n\). Let \(A\) denote the average of \(N\) for fixed \(c\) and fixed \(m_i\). In this paper, the authors study the sum \(\sum\{N(a_1,\ldots,a_r) - A\}^2\), where the summation is taken over all non-zero \(a_i\). In case \(c=0\), discussions on the \(N(a_1,\ldots,a_r)\) are given for some special values of \(m_i\).