On the Carlitz problem on the number of solutions to some special equations over finite fields
We consider an equation of the type over the finite field . Carlitz obtained formulas for the number of solutions to this equation when and when and . In our earlier papers, we found formulas for the number of solutions when or or ; and when and is a power of modulo . In this paper, we obtain formulas for the number of solutions when , , or . For general case, we derive lower bounds for the number of solutions.