OPEN
Can the product of an arithmetic progression of positive integers $n,n+d,\ldots,n+(k-1)d$ of length $k\geq 4$ (with $(n,d)=1$) be a perfect power?
Erdős believed not. Erdős and Selfridge
[ErSe75] proved that the product of consecutive integers is never a perfect power.
The theory of Pell equations implies that there are infinitely many pairs $n,d$ with $(n,d)=1$ such that $n(n+d)(n+2d)$ is a square.
Considering the question of whether the product of an arithmetic progression of length $k$ can be equal to an $\ell$th power:
- Euler proved this is impossible when $k=4$ and $\ell=2$,
- Obláth [Ob51] proved this is impossible when $(k,l)=(5,2),(3,3),(3,4),(3,5)$.
- Marszalek [Ma85] proved that this is only possible for $k\ll_d 1$, where $d$ is the common difference of the arithmetic progression.
Jakob Führer has observed this is possible for integers in general, for example $(-6)\cdot(-1)\cdot 4\cdot 9=6^3$.