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Problem 1355

AIME late
Number theory Difficulty 5.2 Find the answer HMMT February

For any positive integer nn, let τ(n)\tau(n) denote the number of positive divisors of nn. If nn is a positive integer such that τ(n2)τ(n)=3\frac{\tau\left(n^{2}\right)}{\tau(n)}=3, compute τ(n7)τ(n)\frac{\tau\left(n^{7}\right)}{\tau(n)}.

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

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Official solution

Let the prime factorization of nn be n=p1e1p2e2⋯pkekn=p_{1}^{e_{1}} p_{2}^{e_{2}} \cdots p_{k}^{e_{k}}. Then, the problem condition is equivalent to ∏i=1k2ei+1ei+1=3\prod_{i=1}^{k} \frac{2 e_{i}+1}{e_{i}+1}=3 Note that since 2x+1x+1≥1.5\frac{2 x+1}{x+1} \geq 1.5 for x≥1x \geq 1, and 1.53>31.5^{3}>3, we have k≤2k \leq 2. Also, k=1k=1 implies 2e1+1=3(e1+1)2 e_{1}+1=3\left(e_{1}+1\right), which implies e1e_{1} is negative. Thus, we must have k=2k=2. Then, our equation becomes (2e1+1)(2e2+1)=3(e1+1)(e2+1)\left(2 e_{1}+1\right)\left(2 e_{2}+1\right)=3\left(e_{1}+1\right)\left(e_{2}+1\right) which simplifies to (e1−1)(e2−1)=3\left(e_{1}-1\right)\left(e_{2}-1\right)=3. This gives us e1=2e_{1}=2 and e2=4e_{2}=4. Thus, we have n=p2q4n=p^{2} q^{4} for primes pp and qq, so τ(n7)τ(n)=τ(p14q28)τ(p2q4)=15⋅293⋅5=29\frac{\tau\left(n^{7}\right)}{\tau(n)}=\frac{\tau\left(p^{14} q^{28}\right)}{\tau\left(p^{2} q^{4}\right)}=\frac{15 \cdot 29}{3 \cdot 5}=29.

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