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Algebra Difficulty 5.8 AIME, harder Prove it Vietnam

Find all real numbers aa such that there exists a function f:RRf: \mathbb{R} \rightarrow \mathbb{R} satisfying the following conditions

i) f(1)=2016f(1) = 2016;
ii) f(x+y+f(y))=f(x)+ayf(x + y + f(y)) = f(x) + ay for all real numbers x,yx, y.

Solution

For a=0a = 0, we can check that the function f(x)=2016f(x) = 2016 for all real numbers xx is satisfied.

Now we consider the case a0a \neq 0. By plugging x=f(y)x = -f(y) in condition ii), we have
f(y)=f(f(y))+ay f(y) = f(-f(y)) + ay
for all real numbers yy. Hence, ff is injective.

Next, by letting y=0y = 0 in ii), we obtain
f(x+f(0))=f(x) f(x + f(0)) = f(x)
for all real numbers xx. Thus, f(0)=0f(0) = 0.

Setting y=f(x)ay = \frac{-f(x)}{a} in ii) and combining the injectivity of ff, we obtain that
f(x)a+f(f(x)a)=x -\frac{f(x)}{a} + f\left(-\frac{f(x)}{a}\right) = -x
for all real numbers xx.

Replacing yy by f(y)a-\frac{f(y)}{a} in ii) and applying the above equation, it implies
f(xy)=f(x)f(y) f(x - y) = f(x) - f(y)
for all real numbers x,yx, y. Thus, ff is additive and we can easily compute f(2016)=2016f(1)=20162f(2016) = 2016f(1) = 2016^2.

On the other hand, because ff is additive then the condition ii) can be rewritten as f(y)+f(f(y))=ayf(y) + f(f(y)) = ay for all real numbers yy. Letting y=1y = 1, we have a=20162017a = 2016 \cdot 2017. For a=20162017a = 2016 \cdot 2017, we can directly check that f(x)=2016xf(x) = 2016x is satisfied.

Therefore, a=0a = 0 or a=20162017a = 2016 \cdot 2017 are desired values. \boxed{}

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