Description

Catalan's Conjecture predicts that 8 and 9 are the only consecutive perfect powers among positive integers. The conjecture, which dates back to 1844, was recently proven by the Swiss mathematician Preda Mihailescu. A deep theorem about cyclotomic elds plays a crucial role in his proof. Like Fermat's problem, this problem has a rich history with some surprising turns. The present article surveys the main lines of this history and outlines Mihailescu's brilliant proof.