Find all prime numbers for which there exist positive integers and such that the number
is a product of exactly three distinct prime numbers.
Find all prime numbers for which there exist positive integers and such that the number
is a product of exactly three distinct prime numbers.
Let . For , we take and . Then . For we can take and and . Then again . For we can take and and . Again .
Assume now that . Working modulo 2 and modulo 3 we see that is divisible by both 2 and 3. Moreover, by Fermat's Little Theorem, we have
Therefore, by the given condition, we have to solve the equation
If one of the numbers and is bigger than or equal to 2, let's say , then
It is easy to check by induction that for all natural numbers . This contradiction shows that there are no more values of which satisfy the required property.
Remark. There are a couple of other ways to prove that for . For example, we can use the Binomial Theorem as follows:
We can also use Bernoulli's Inequality as follows:
The last inequality is true for . For we can see directly that .
One can also use calculus to show that is increasing for .
To find all prime numbers for which there exist positive integers , , and such that the number is a product of exactly three distinct prime numbers, we proceed as follows:
1. **Verification for **:
- For :
Choose :
, which is a product of three distinct primes.
- For :
Choose :
, which is a product of three distinct primes.
- For :
Choose :
, which is a product of three distinct primes.
2. **Proof of necessity for **:
- Suppose . Note that by Fermat's Little Theorem, for any integer :
Therefore:
This implies:
Hence, .
- Additionally, for any odd prime and positive integer :
Proof:
- If , then and are both even.
- If , then and are both odd.
- If , then .
- If , then by Fermat's Little Theorem, , so .
- Thus:
This implies:
Since is a product of exactly three distinct primes, let where are distinct primes.
- For , consider:
Since at least one of is greater than 1, we have:
For :
This leads to a contradiction because cannot be a product of exactly three distinct primes if it exceeds .
Therefore, the only possible primes are and .
The final answer is .