Find the smallest positive integer such that is a perfect cube, and is a perfect square.
Solution
Since is divisible by , we can write , where is a positive integer divisible neither by nor , while and are non-negative integers. If is a perfect cube, then divides and divides . If is a perfect square, then divides and divides . From this it follows that divides and divides , so is at least and is at least . The smallest possible positive integer is . When this is the case, we get . We see that is indeed a perfect cube and is a perfect square, and we have shown this to be the smallest possible.
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