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A050788 Consider the Diophantine equation x^3+y^3=z^3-1 (x<y<z) or 'Fermat near misses'. Arrange solutions by increasing values of z. Sequence gives values of x. 5
6, 71, 135, 372, 426, 242, 566, 791, 236, 575, 1938, 2676, 1124, 2196, 1943, 1851, 1943, 7676, 3318, 10866, 3086, 3453, 17328, 4607, 28182, 10230, 25765, 31212, 7251, 34199, 6560, 15218, 29196, 54101, 32882, 51293, 17384, 8999, 58462, 75263 (list; graph; refs; listen; history; internal format)
OFFSET

1,1

COMMENTS

Comments from Fred W. Helenius (fredh(AT)ix.netcom.com), Jul 22 2008: (Start)

There is an infinite family of solutions to c^3+1=a^3+b^3 given by

(a,b,c) = (9n^3 + 1, 9n^4, 9n^4 + 3n). The present sequence actually asks about

x^3+y^3=z^3-1 with x < y < z; for that we can take

(x,y,z) = (9n^3 - 1, 9n^4 - 3n, 9n^4) for n > 1.

I extracted these solutions from Theorem 235 in Hardy & Wright; the

result shown there is that all nontrivial rational solutions of

x^3 + y^3 = u^3 + v^3 are given by

x = r(1 - (a - 3b)(a^2 + 3b^2))

y = r((a + 3b)(a^2 + 3b^2) - 1)

u = r((a + 3b) - (a^2 + 3b^2)^2)

v = r((a^2 + 3b^2)^2 - (a - 3b))

where r,a,b are rational and r is not zero.

Specializing to r = 1, b = n/2 and a = 3n/2 gives

x = 1, y = 9n^3 - 1, u = 3n - 9n^4, v = 9n^4.

The solutions given above are obtained by changing signs and moving

cubes from one side of the equation to the other as necessary.

Unfortunately, not all integral solutions are found so easily: the

third value in A050788 corresponds to 135^3 + 138^3 = 172^3 - 1;

this is not produced by such simple choices of r,a,b. (End)

REFERENCES

Ian Stewart, "Game, Set and Math", Chapter 8, 'Close Encounters of the Fermat Kind', Penguin Books, Ed. 1991, pp. 107-124.

David Wells, "Curious and Interesting Numbers", Revised Ed. 1997, Penguin Books, On number "729", p. 147.

LINKS

Eric Weisstein's World of Mathematics, Diophantine Equation - 3rd Powers

EXAMPLE

E.g. (575)^3 + 2292^3 = 2304^3 - 1.

CROSSREFS

Cf. A050787, A050789, A050790.

Sequence in context: A001448 A024489 A036361 * A027317 A099339 A023038

Adjacent sequences:  A050785 A050786 A050787 * A050789 A050790 A050791

KEYWORD

nonn

AUTHOR

Patrick De Geest (pdg(AT)worldofnumbers.com), Sep 15 1999.

EXTENSIONS

More terms from Jud McCranie (JudMcCranie(AT)ugaalum.uga.edu), Dec 25 2000

Further terms from Don Reble (djr(AT)nk.ca), Nov 29 2001

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Last modified February 15 17:13 EST 2012. Contains 205828 sequences.