Maths Olympiad Prep

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Number theory Difficulty 5.2 AIME, harder Find the answer

Find all pairs of integer solutions (n,m)(n, m) to 23n=32m12^{3^{n}}=3^{2^{m}}-1.

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

Solution

We find all solutions of 2x=3y12^{x}=3^{y}-1 for positive integers xx and yy. If x=1x=1, we obtain the solution x=1,y=1x=1, y=1, which corresponds to (n,m)=(0,0)(n, m)=(0,0) in the original problem. If x>1x>1, consider the equation modulo 4. The left hand side is 0, and the right hand side is (1)y1(-1)^{y}-1, so yy is even. Thus we can write y=2zy=2 z for some positive integer zz, and so 2x=(3z1)(3z+1)2^{x}=(3^{z}-1)(3^{z}+1). Thus each of 3z13^{z}-1 and 3z+13^{z}+1 is a power of 2, but they differ by 2, so they must equal 2 and 4 respectively. Therefore, the only other solution is x=3x=3 and y=2y=2, which corresponds to (n,m)=(1,1)(n, m)=(1,1) in the original problem.

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