Let be pairwise distinct positive integers and . The division of by gives the quotient and leaves the remainder , where is a non-negative integer.
Find the remainder of the division of by .
Romanian Mathematical Olympiad
Solution
Assume, without loss of generality, that . Then , whence
Since , the numbers , and are positive integers, hence , , are even, and is odd.
For parity reasons, (1) yields and , hence and .
This gives
whence , so .
Moreover, , so , therefore and , that is and .
The above yield
so the remainder of the division of the sum by is .
Want a route through all this instead of an archive? The track
puts 2,604 problems in a working order, from Junior Challenge level to the IMO shortlist.