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Saudi Arabian Mathematical Competitions, 2015

Number theory Difficulty 5.4 AIME, harder Prove it Saudi Arabia

Prove that there exist infinitely many non prime positive integers nn such that 7n−1−3n−17^{n-1} - 3^{n-1} is divisible by nn.

Solution

We will look for integers of the form n=7a−3an = 7^{a} - 3^{a} with aa dividing n−1n-1. Clearly, if aa exists then n=7a−3an = 7^{a} - 3^{a} divides 7n−1−3n−17^{n-1} - 3^{n-1}.

Let a=3ra = 3^{r} for r≥1r \geq 1. We have n=7a−3a≡(−1)3r−33r≡4(mod8)n = 7^{a} - 3^{a} \equiv (-1)^{3^{r}} - 3^{3^{r}} \equiv 4 \pmod{8}. We deduce that nn is a composite number.

On the other hand, because 33 divides 7−17-1, we have from the Lifting The Exponent theorem that v3(7a−1)=v3(7−1)+v3(a)=r+1v_{3}\left(7^{a} - 1\right) = v_{3}(7-1) + v_{3}(a) = r+1. We deduce that a=3ra = 3^{r} divides 73r−17^{3^{r}} - 1 and therefore it divides n−1=73r−1+33rn-1 = 7^{3^{r}} - 1 + 3^{3^{r}}. But there are infinitely many such aa. This solves the problem.

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