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Berkeley Math Circle: Monthly Contest 1

Number theory Difficulty 5.0 AIME Prove it United States

Problem:
Find all positive integers N,nN, n such that N2N^{2} is 1 away from n(N+n)n(N+n).

Solution

Solution:
The solutions are (N,n)=(Fi+1,Fi)(N, n)=\left(F_{i+1}, F_{i}\right).

If N>nN>n, N2−n(N+n)=N(N−n)−n2N^{2}-n(N+n)=N(N-n)-n^{2}, so (N,n)(N, n) works if and only if (n,N−n)(n, N-n) works.

If N≤nN \leq n, n(N+n)−N2≥n2≥1n(N+n)-N^{2} \geq n^{2} \geq 1, so the only solution is (N,n)=(1,1)(N, n)=(1,1).

Thus, all solutions eventually become (1,1)(1,1) after repeatedly applying the operation (N,n)↦(n,N−n)(N, n) \mapsto(n, N-n), so reversing this process, every solution comes from repeatedly applying the operation (N,n)↦(N+n,N)(N, n) \mapsto(N+n, N) to (1,1)(1,1).

This operation maps (Fi,Fi−1)\left(F_{i}, F_{i-1}\right) to (Fi+1,Fi)\left(F_{i+1}, F_{i}\right), and (1,1)=(F2,F1)(1,1)=\left(F_{2}, F_{1}\right), giving the desired via induction.

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Source: MathNet, licensed CC-BY-4.0. Statement reproduced verbatim; metadata (topic, difficulty) added by this project.