Maths Olympiad Prep

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, 2023

Number theory Difficulty 5.6 AIME, harder Prove it Turkey

Find all triples (n,k,p)(n, k, p) satisfying the equation
6n217n39=pk |6n^2 - 17n - 39| = p^k
where n,kn, k are integers and pp is a prime.

Solution

Answer: (n,k,p)=(4,3,5),(2,1,19),(1,4,2),(2,2,7),(4,1,11)(n, k, p) = (-4, 3, 5), (-2, 1, 19), (-1, 4, 2), (2, 2, 7), (4, 1, 11).
Writing
pk=6n217n39=(2n+3)(3n13), p^k = |6n^2 - 17n - 39| = |(2n + 3)(3n - 13)|,
we get
2n+3=±pα,3n13=±pβ 2n + 3 = \pm p^{\alpha}, \quad 3n - 13 = \pm p^{\beta}
for some non-negative integers α,β\alpha, \beta. Examining the cases α=0\alpha = 0 or β=0\beta = 0, we find the possibilities n=1,n=2n = -1, n = -2 and n=4n = 4, which gives the solutions (n,k,p)=(2,1,19),(1,4,2),(4,1,11)(n, k, p) = (-2, 1, 19), (-1, 4, 2), (4, 1, 11).
If α,β1\alpha, \beta \ge 1, we have p(2n+3)p|(2n+3) and p(3n13)p|(3n-13), hence we get p35p|35,
so p{5,7}p \in \{5,7\}. Note that pαβ=±2n+33n13p^{\alpha-\beta} = \pm \frac{2n+3}{3n-13}. However, if n17n \ge 17 or n5n \ge -5, it is clear that 15<2n+33n13<1\frac{1}{5} < \frac{2n+3}{3n-13} < 1, which means that αβ\alpha-\beta is not an integer as p{5,7}p \in \{5,7\}, a contradiction.
As a result, we need to examine the cases 4n16-4 \le n \le 16. We can eliminate some of them directly as follows. Note that if p=5p=5, then we have: n1(mod5)n \equiv 1 \pmod 5 whereas p=7p=7 implies n2(mod7)n \equiv 2 \pmod 7. Moreover, 3n133n-13 is odd, so nn must be even. Then, we only need to check the values n{4,2,6,16}n \in \{-4,2,6,16\}, which gives the solutions (n,k,p)=(4,3,5),(2,2,7)(n, k, p) = (-4, 3, 5), (2, 2, 7).

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