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Number theory Difficulty 7.0 National olympiad Find the answer

Let N\mathbb{N} be the set of positive integers. Find all functions f:NNf: \mathbb{N} \rightarrow \mathbb{N} such that:

n+f(m) divides f(n)+nf(m) n+f(m) \text { divides } f(n)+n f(m)

A number or a short expression. Spacing and $ signs are ignored.

Solution

The striking thing about this problem is that the relation concerns divisibility rather than equality. How can we exploit this? We are given that n+f(m)f(n)+nf(m)n+f(m) \mid f(n)+n f(m) but we can certainly add or subtract multiples of the left hand side from the right hand side and preserve the divisibility. This leads to a key idea:
'Eliminate one of the variables from the right hand side.'
Clearly n+f(m)f(n)+nf(m)n(n+f(m))n+f(m) \mid f(n)+n f(m)-n(n+f(m)) so for any n,mn, m we have

n+f(m)f(n)n2 n+f(m) \mid f(n)-n^{2}

This feels like a strong condition: if we fix nn and let f(m)f(m) go to infinity, then f(n)n2f(n)-n^{2} will have arbitrarily large factors, which implies it must be zero.

We must be careful: this argument is fine, so long as the function ff takes arbitrarily large values. (We also need to check that f(n)=n2f(n)=n^{2} satisfies the original statement which it does.)

We are left with the case where ff takes only finitely many values.
In this case ff must take the same value infinitely often, so it is natural to focus on an infinite set SNS \subset \mathbb{N} such that f(s)=kf(s)=k for all sSs \in S. If n,mSn, m \in S then the original statement gives n+kk+nkn+k \mid k+n k where kk is fixed and nn can be as large as we like.

Now we recycle our key idea and eliminate nn from the right.
n+kk+nkk(n+k)n+k \mid k+n k-k(n+k) so n+kkk2n+k \mid k-k^{2} for arbitrarily large nn. This means that kk2=0k-k^{2}=0 so k=1k=1, since it must be positive.

At this point we suspect that f(n)=1f(n)=1 for all nn is the only bounded solution, so we pick some tt such that f(t)=L>1f(t)=L>1 and try to get a contradiction.

In the original statement we can set m=tm=t and get n+Lf(n)+nLn+L \mid f(n)+n L. Eliminating LL from the right gives us nothing new, so how can we proceed? Well, we have an infinite set SS such that ff is constantly 1 on SS so we can take nSn \in S to obtain n+L1+nLn+L \mid 1+n L

Using our key idea one more time and eliminating nn from the right, we get n+L1L2n+L \mid 1-L^{2} for arbitrarily large nn which is impossible if L>1L>1.

A rather different solution can be found by playing around with small values of mm and nn.
As before it helps to establish ()(\star) but now (n,m)=(1,1)(n, m)=(1,1) gives 1+f(1)f(1)11+f(1) \mid f(1)-1.
The left is bigger than the right, so the right must be zero f(1)=1-f(1)=1.
Now try (n,m)=(2,1)(n, m)=(2,1) and obtain 2+f(2)f(2)42+f(2) \mid f(2)-4. Subtracting the left from the right gives 2+f(2)62+f(2) \mid-6. Since f(2)Nf(2) \in \mathbb{N} the left is a factor of -6 which is bigger than 2 . This gives f(2)=1f(2)=1 or f(2)=4f(2)=4.

In the first case we can plug this back into the original statement to get 2+f(m)1+2f(m)2+f(m) \mid 1+2 f(m). Now taking two copies of the left away from the right we have 2+f(m)32+f(m) \mid-3.

Thus 2+f(m)2+f(m) must a factor of -3 which is bigger than 2 , so f(m)=1f(m)=1 for any mm.
Before proceeding with the case f(2)=4f(2)=4 we take another look at our strong result ()(\star). Setting n=mn=m gives n+f(n)f(n)n2n+f(n) \mid f(n)-n^{2} so taking f(n)n2f(n)-n^{2} away from n+f(n)n+f(n) shows that

n+f(n)n+n2 n+f(n) \mid n+n^{2}

Let see if we can use ()(\star) and ()(\dagger) to pin down the value of f(3)f(3), using f(2)=4f(2)=4.
From ()(\star) we have 3+4f(3)93+4 \mid f(3)-9 and from ()(\dagger) we have 3+f(3)123+f(3) \mid 12. The second of these shows f(3)f(3) is 1,3 or 9 , but 1 and 3 are too small to work in the first relation.

Similarly, setting (n,m)=(4,3)(n, m)=(4,3) in ()(\star) gives 4+9f(4)164+9 \mid f(4)-16 while n=4n=4 in ()(\dagger) gives 4+f(4)204+f(4) \mid 20. The latter shows f(4)16f(4) \leq 16 so 1316f(4)13 \mid 16-f(4). The only possible multiples of 13 are 0 and 13 , of which only the first one works. Thus f(4)=16f(4)=16.

Now we are ready to try induction. Assume f(n1)=(n1)2f(n-1)=(n-1)^{2} and use ()(\star) and ()(\dagger) to obtain n+(n1)2f(n)n2n+(n-1)^{2} \mid f(n)-n^{2} and n+f(n)n+n2n+f(n) \mid n+n^{2}. The latter implies f(n)n2f(n) \leq n^{2} so the former becomes n2n+1n2f(n)n^{2}-n+1 \mid n^{2}-f(n). If f(n)n2f(n) \neq n^{2} then n2f(n)=1×(n2n+1)n^{2}-f(n)=1 \times\left(n^{2}-n+1\right) since any other multiple would be too large. However, putting f(n)=n1f(n)=n-1 into n+f(n)n+n2n+f(n) \mid n+n^{2} implies 2n1n(1+n)2 n-1 \mid n(1+n). This is a contradiction since 2n12 n-1 is coprime to nn and clearly cannot divide 1+n1+n.

for all m,nNm, n \in \mathbb{N}.

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Source: NuminaMath-1.5, licensed Apache-2.0. Statement and solution reproduced as published; topic and difficulty added by this site.