2 As I’m fond of saying, this one looks way gnarlier than it is. All you need to do to get it is recognize the difference of two squares form: a^4 is a perfect square and so is b^8. So we can factor:

    \begin{align*}a^{4}-b^{8}=\left(a^2+b^4\right)\left(a^2-b^4\right)\end{align*}

And look a^2-b^4 is still a difference of two squares! We…

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