Big Advance on Simple-Sounding Math Problem Was a Century in the Making

One morning last November, the mathematician Hector Pasten finally solved the problem that had been dogging him for more than a decade by using a time-tested productivity hack: procrastination. He was supposed to be writing a final exam for his number theory class at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile in Santiago. To avoid the task, he started pondering, for the umpteenth time…

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