Find all prime numbers and such that divides and divides .
Solution
and divides together imply divides . Hence . But then divides is not satisfied. Thus is odd.
and divides together imply but contradicts divides . Thus and are both odd.
is even and so . Hence .
Now examine each of the cases . Only one case provides a solution in which .
Second solution: By hypothesis, there are such that . Hence
where are nonnegative integers. Suppose . Then
and so . An inspection of the possible pairs that can be formed from this set shows that no such pair satisfies the hypotheses. Hence, one of is zero. Suppose . Then which means that , which isn't a prime number. It follows that , i.e., and hence . Thus is the only solution pair.
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