Olympiad Maths Prep

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Number theory Difficulty 5.1 AIME, harder Prove it South Korea

Find all pairs of positive integers mm, nn satisfying the equation 3m7n=23^m - 7^n = 2.

Solution

Since 3m20(mod7)3^m - 2 \equiv 0 \pmod{7}, one may easily show that m2(mod6)m \equiv 2 \pmod{6}. If m=2m = 2 then n=1n = 1, which is a solution of the equation.

Assume that m=2s4m = 2s \ge 4. Note that 2+7n2 + 7^n is divisible by 2727 in this case and
791(mod27),712(mod27). 7^9 \equiv 1 \pmod{27}, \quad 7^1 \equiv -2 \pmod{27}.
Hence we have n4(mod9)n \equiv 4 \pmod{9}. If we let n=9t+4n = 9t + 4, then
2+79t+42+7435(mod37). 2 + 7^{9t+4} \equiv 2 + 7^4 \equiv 35 \pmod{37}.
For any positive integer uu less than 1010,
9n9,7,26,12,34,10,16,33,1(mod37). 9^n \equiv 9, 7, 26, 12, 34, 10, 16, 33, 1 \pmod{37}.
Therefore there does not exist a solution for any m4m \ge 4. \square

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