Small gaps between primes exist.

DOI10.3792/PJAA.82.61MaRDI QIDQ863751zbMATH OpenOpenAlexWikidataFDO

Authors Daniel Alan Goldston, C. Y. Yildirim, Yoichi Motohashi, János Pintz

Publication date 7 February 2007

Published in Proceedings of the Japan Academy. Series A (Search for Journal in Brave)

Full work available at URL https://arxiv.org/abs/math/0505300, https://projecteuclid.org/euclid.pja/1146576181

zbMATH Keywords

gaps between primesprime tuplessieve methods

Mathematics Subject Classification ID

Distribution of primes (11N05) Applications of sieve methods (11N36)

Abstract: In the recent preprint [3], Goldston, Pintz, and Y{i}ld{i}r{i}m established, among other things, ${\displaystyle }$ liminf_{n oinfty}{p_{n+1}-p_noverlog p_n}=0,leqno(0) ${\displaystyle }$ with $p_n$ the $n$th prime. In the present article, which is essentially self-contained, we shall develop a simplified account of the method used in [3]. While [3] also includes quantitative versions of $(0)$, we are concerned here solely with proving the qualitative $(0)$, which still exhibits all the essentials of the method. We also show here that an improvement of the Bombieri--Vinogradov prime number theorem would give rise infinitely often to bounded differences between consecutive primes. We include a short expository last section. Detailed discussions of quantitative results and a historical review will appear in the publication version of [3] and its continuations.

Review text

Let \(p_n\) denote the \(n\)th prime number. The differences \(p_{n+1} - p_n\) are one of the central objects of study in the theory of distribution of primes. In this paper, the authors are concerned with the limit \[ \Delta = \liminf_{n \to \infty} \frac {p_{n+1} - p_n}{\log p_n}. \] Non-trivial upper bounds for this limit have long been considered approximations to the twin-prime conjecture, and several such bounds have been obtained over the years. Because of the twin-prime conjecture, it was conjectured that \(\Delta = 0\), but until recently even this weaker conjecture was considered well beyond the reach of present methods. That changed in late 2004, when Goldston, Pintz and Yıldırım proved that \(\Delta = 0\). Their original proof, together with proofs of a number of other related -- and equally exciting results -- will appear in a series of papers entitled \textit{Primes in tuples} [I, Ann. Math. (2) 170, No. 2, 819--862 (2009; Zbl 1207.11096), II, Acta Math. 204, No. 1, 1--47 (2010; Zbl 1207.11097), III, Funct. Approximatio, Comment. Math. 35, 79--89 (2006; Zbl 1196.11123)]. In the paper under review, the authors give an independent, simplified (and essentially self-contained) proof that \[ \Delta \leq \max\{ 0, 2\theta - 1\}, \eqno{(*)} \] where \(\theta\) is any real number with the following property: Given any fixed \(A > 0\), \[ \sum_{q \leq x^{\theta}} \max_{y \leq x} \max_{a: (a,q)=1} \left| \sum_{_{\substack{ p \leq y\\ p \equiv a \pmod q}}} \log p - \frac y{\phi(q)} \right| \ll \frac x{(\log x)^A}. \] Since the Bombieri-Vinogradov theorem allows us to take \(\theta\) arbitrarily close to \(1/2\), inequality (*) above establishes that \(\Delta = 0\).

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• Prime pairs and the zeta function
• Landau's problems on primes
• Small differences between prime numbers
• Fractional parts of noninteger powers of primes
• Bounded gaps between primes of special form
• A generalization of the Goldston-Pintz-Yildirim prime gaps result to number fields
• Sign changes of Kloosterman sums with almost prime moduli
• A generalization of Dirichlet approximation theorem for the affine actions on real line
• Dense admissible sequences
• On limit points of the sequence of normalized prime gaps
• Positive proportion of small gaps between consecutive primes
• Strings of congruent primes in short intervals
• The Goldston–Pintz–Yıldırım sieve and maximal gaps
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• Small gaps between prime numbers: The work of Goldston-Pintz-Yildirim
• Poincaré and analytic number theory
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• On cluster primes
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• The existence of small prime gaps in subsets of the integers
• On the set of the difference of primes
• Small gaps between primes and primes in arithmetic progressions to large moduli
• The path to recent progress on small gaps between primes
• What is good mathematics?
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• Primes in tuples. II
• Primes in tuples. I
• Primes in tuples. III: On the difference \(p_{n+\nu}-p_n\)

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