Maths Olympiad Prep

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Number theory Difficulty 5.5 AIME, harder Find the answer

13. Find all pairs of positive integers (x,y)(x, y) such that xx+y=yyxx^{x+y}=y^{y-x}.

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

Solution

13. Let the pair of positive integers (x,y)(x, y) satisfy the condition, then xy(xy)x=yyx^{y}(x y)^{x}=y^{y}, hence xyyyx^{y} \mid y^{y}, so xyx \mid y. Let y=kx,kNy=k x, k \in \mathbf{N}^{*}, then ky=(kx2)xk^{y}=\left(k x^{2}\right)^{x}, thus kk=kx2k^{k}=k x^{2}, which means x2=kk1x^{2}=k^{k-1}. Therefore, all pairs of positive integers (x,y)(x, y) that satisfy the condition are ((2n+1)n,(2n+1)n+1)\left((2 n+1)^{n},(2 n+1)^{n+1}\right) or ((2m)4m21,(2m)4m2+1)\left((2 m)^{4 m^{2}-1},(2 m)^{4 m^{2}+1}\right), where m,nm, n are any positive integers.

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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.