Maths Olympiad Prep

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, 2024

Number theory Difficulty 5.7 AIME, harder Prove it Turkey

Let nn be a positive integer and kk be the number of positive divisors of nn. If any two positive divisors of nn have different remainders when divided by k+1k + 1, then show that either k+1k + 1 is a prime number or equal to 44.

Solution

We consider two cases.

Case 1: x=0x = 0 is one of the remainders.

Then k+1k+1 divides exactly one of the divisors. Thus k+1k+1 divides nn and indeed k+1=nk+1 = n. So k+1k+1 has kk positive divisors. Then kk+1k|k+1 or k1k+1k-1|k+1. Therefore, k=1,2k=1,2 or 33, that is k+1=2,3k+1=2,3 or 44.

Case 2: 00 is not one of the remainders.

Suppose that k+1k+1 is not prime. Then k+1=pmk+1 = pm where pp is a prime number and m>1m > 1 is an integer. The ones with the remainders p,2p,,p(m1)p, 2p, \dots, p(m-1) are the ones which are divisible by pp. Let n=parn = p^a r where gcd(p,r)=1\gcd(p, r) = 1. Let ss be the number of positive divisors of rr. Then k=(α+1)sk = (\alpha+1)s and m1=αsm-1 = \alpha s is the number of positive divisors of nn which are divisible by pp. Then we have
2<pm1m1=km1=(α+1)sαs=α+1α2, 2 < \frac{pm-1}{m-1} = \frac{k}{m-1} = \frac{(\alpha+1)s}{\alpha s} = \frac{\alpha+1}{\alpha} \le 2,
which is a contradiction. Thus, in this case k+1k+1 has to be prime.

Remark: By Dirichlet's theorem and primitive roots, for any prime number pp there exists a prime number qq such that n=qp2n = q^{p-2} has p1p-1 positive divisors and they all have distinct remainders when divided by pp.

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