Goldbach and Ternary Goldbach Problems
The Goldbach conjecture (every even is a sum of two primes) remains open, but the ternary version (every odd is a sum of three primes) was proved by Helfgott in 2013, completing a line of research initiated by Vinogradov.
Vinogradov's Three-Primes Theorem
Vinogradov's theorem (1937): Every sufficiently large odd integer is a sum of three primes. The number of representations is: for any , where for odd .
Helfgott (2013) verified the ternary Goldbach conjecture for all odd by: (1) proving Vinogradov's theorem for with explicit error terms using detailed zero-free region computations; (2) verifying computationally that every odd integer is a sum of three primes, using Oliveira e Silva's verification of binary Goldbach up to .
The Binary Goldbach Problem
The binary Goldbach conjecture: every even is a sum of two primes. The circle method gives: where the singular series for even . The error term is controlled by exceptional zeros of Dirichlet L-functions.
Let denote the number of even integers that are not sums of two primes. Current bounds: (Pintz), improving on Montgomery-Vaughan's . Under GRH, . The conjecture is for all . Computationally verified for (Oliveira e Silva, Herzog, Pardi).
Techniques
The key difficulty for Goldbach (compared to Waring) is that the generating function involves primes, not powers. On major arcs: by the PNT in arithmetic progressions. On minor arcs: the bound (Vinogradov) requires sophisticated type I/II estimates.