Shortest Distance in Modular Cubic Polynomials

Abstract

In this paper, we study how small a box contains at least two points from a modular cubic polynomial $y \equiv a x^3 + b x^2 + c x + d \pmod p$ with $(a, p) = 1$. We prove that some square of side length $p^{1/6 + \epsilon}$ contains two such points.