Determine all monic polynomials with real coefficients satisfying the following properties:
1) is nonconstant and all its roots are real and distinct;
2) if and are roots of , then so is .
Solution
Let and define ( times). Let be a root of . From the second property, we see that are also roots of .
We subdivide the range of into four subintervals.
Case 1: If , then . Since is strictly increasing over the interval , we have .
Case 2: If , then . Since is strictly increasing over the interval , we have .
Case 3: If , then . Substituting for by in Case 2, we get .
Case 4: If , then . Substituting for by in Case 1, we get .
From the four cases, we infer that if , then has infinitely many distinct roots, which is impossible. Hence, and by direct checking all the possible are
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