Let k ≤ 2 be an integer, and set

Ek (X) = |{n ≤ X, n ≠ mk, n not a sum of a prime and a k-th power}|.

We prove that there exists δ = δ(k) > 0 such that Ek (X)Ek(X)≪kX1−δ.

§1. Introduction. The literature on solving a system of linear equations in primes is quite limited, although the multi-dimensional Hardy-Littlewood method certainly provides an approach to this problem. The Goldbach- Vinogradov theorem and van der Corput's proof of the existence of infinitely many three term arithmetic progressions in primes are two particular results in the special case of only one equation. Recently Liu and Tsang [4] studied this case in full generality and obtained a result with excellent uniformity in the coefficients. Almost no other general result has appeared so far, due probably to the fact that such a theorem is clumsy to state.

The object of this paper is to obtain improvements in Vinogradov's mean value theorem widely applicable in additive number theory. Let Js,k(P) denote the number of solutions of the simultaneous diophantine equations

with 1 ≥ xi, yi ≥ P for 1 ≥ i ≥ s. In the mid-thirties Vinogradov developed a new method (now known as Vinogradov's mean value theorem) which enabled him to obtain fairly strong bounds for Js,k(P). On writing

in which e(α) denotes e2πiα, we observe that

where Tk denotes the k-dimensional unit cube, and α = (α1,…,αk).