Determine all pairs of positive integers so that and .
Solution
We can conclude that there exist such that and . It follows that
From we get
Since the right hand side is positive, it follows that , that is . Since and are positive integers, we have the following possibilities:
a. , that is . We get , , from which follows .
b. . That is not possible, since from , it follows that and are both odd.
c. , that is , or , . In the first case from , we get , . Analogously, in the second case we get , .
Hence, all the solutions are .
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