Maths Olympiad Prep

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Number theory Difficulty 5.2 AIME, harder Find the answer

There are two prime numbers pp so that 5p5 p can be expressed in the form n25\left\lfloor\frac{n^{2}}{5}\right\rfloor for some positive integer nn. What is the sum of these two prime numbers?

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

Solution

Note that the remainder when n2n^{2} is divided by 5 must be 0,1 , or 4 . Then we have that 25p=n225 p=n^{2} or 25p=n2125 p=n^{2}-1 or 25p=n2425 p=n^{2}-4. In the first case there are no solutions. In the second case, if 25p=(n1)(n+1)25 p=(n-1)(n+1), then we must have n1=25n-1=25 or n+1=25n+1=25 as n1n-1 and n+1n+1 cannot both be divisible by 5 , and also cannot both have a factor besides 25 . Similarly, in the third case, 25p=(n2)(n+2)25 p=(n-2)(n+2), so we must have n2=25n-2=25 or n+2=25n+2=25. Therefore the nn we have to check are 23,24,26,2723,24,26,27. These give values of p=21,p=23,p=27p=21, p=23, p=27, and p=29p=29, of which only 23 and 29 are prime, so the answer is 23+29=5223+29=52.

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