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Number theory Difficulty 7.7 National Olympiad, round 2 Prove it Singapore

Determine all couples of coprime numbers (p,q)(p, q) satisfying:
p3q5=(p+q)2. p^3 - q^5 = (p+q)^2.

Solution

Consider the equation modulo qq, which reduces to p3p2(modq)p^3 \equiv p^2 \pmod{q}. Since pp and qq are coprime (pqp \neq q clearly), we must have p1(modq)p \equiv 1 \pmod{q}.

Consider now the equation modulo q2q^2. Then the equation becomes p3p2+2pq(modq2)p^3 \equiv p^2 + 2pq \pmod{q^2}, and since gcd(p,q)=1\gcd(p, q) = 1, p2p+2q(modq2)p^2 \equiv p + 2q \pmod{q^2}. Let p=1+aqp = 1 + aq for some integer aa. Then the congruence becomes
1+2aq1+aq+2q(modq2) 1 + 2aq \equiv 1 + aq + 2q \pmod{q^2}
and we deduce that a2(modq)a \equiv 2 \pmod{q} and hence p2q+1(modq2)p \equiv 2q + 1 \pmod{q^2}.

We will now that p<(q+1)2=q2+2q+1p < (q+1)^2 = q^2+2q+1, which will mean that p=2q+1p = 2q+1. From the equation we get p3q5p^3 \ge q^5 and hence pqp \ge q, and hence (p+q)24p2(p+q)^2 \le 4p^2. Hence p34p2q5p^3 - 4p^2 \le q^5, or
p2(p4)q5. p^2(p - 4) \le q^5.
But if p(q+1)2p \ge (q+1)^2, then p2>q4p^2 > q^4 and p4q2p-4 \ge q^2 (since q2q \ge 2). We obtain the desired contradiction.

Now substituting p=2q+1p = 2q + 1 into the original equation we obtain
q38q3=0. q^3 - 8q - 3 = 0.
The only integer solution is q=3q = 3. Hence the only possible solution is q=3q = 3, which gives p=7p = 7. It is easy to check that this gives a solution to the equation.

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