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Number theory Difficulty 5.3 AIME, harder Find the answer

2. Find the prime numbers p,q\mathrm{p}, \mathrm{q} and r such that pqr=3(p+q+r)\mathrm{pqr}=3(\mathrm{p}+\mathrm{q}+\mathrm{r}).

A number or a short expression. Fractions can be typed as 3/2, and spacing doesn't matter.

Solution

Solution. It is obvious that one of the numbers p,q\mathbf{p}, \mathbf{q} and r is 3. Without loss of generality, let p=3p=3. Then qq=3+q+rq \mathbf{q}=3+q+r, from which it follows that q(r1)(r1)=4\mathrm{q}(\mathrm{r}-1)-(\mathrm{r}-1)=4 i.e. (q1)(r1)=4=14=41=22(\mathrm{q}-1) \cdot(\mathrm{r}-1)=4=1 \cdot 4=4 \cdot 1=2 \cdot 2. Then we get three systems of equations with two unknowns {q1=1r1=4;{q1=4r1=1\left\{\begin{array}{l}q-1=1 \\ r-1=4\end{array} ;\left\{\begin{array}{l}q-1=4 \\ r-1=1\end{array}\right.\right. and {q1=2r1=2\left\{\begin{array}{l}q-1=2 \\ r-1=2\end{array}\right. whose solutions are (2,5),(5,2)(2,5),(5,2) and (3,3)(3,3) respectively. The required numbers are (3,2,5),(3,5,2)(3,2,5),(3,5,2) and (3,3,3)(3,3,3).

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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.