Child Labor #2

What is the value of n n such that 1 ! × 2 ! × 3 ! × × n ! 1! \times 2! \times 3! \times \ldots \times n! has exactly 2 n 2n number of trailing zeros?

This is an original problem.


The answer is 23.

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1 solution

Chew-Seong Cheong
Jun 29, 2015

The number of trailing zeros of k ! k! is given by: z k = i = 1 k 5 i z_k =\displaystyle \sum_{i=1}^\infty \left \lfloor \frac{k}{5^i} \right \rfloor , where x \lfloor x \rfloor is the greatest integer function. The number of trailing zeros of a product of factorial is the sum of z k z_k as follows:

Z n = k = 1 n z k = k = 1 n i = 1 k 5 i = 0 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 3 + 3 + . . . \begin{aligned} Z_n & = \sum_{k=1}^n z_k = \sum_{k=1}^n \sum_{i=1}^\infty \left \lfloor \frac{k}{5^i} \right \rfloor \\ & = 0 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 3 + 3 + ... \end{aligned}

\(\begin{array} {} \Rightarrow & Z_9 & = 5 & \color{red}{<} 2\times 9 \\ & Z_{14} & = 10 + 5 = 15 & \color{red}{<} 2\times 14 \\ & Z_{19} & = 15+15 = 30 & \color {red} {<} 2\times 19 \\ & Z_{24} & = 20 +30 = 50 & \color {red} {>} 2\times 24 \end{array} \)

19 < n < 24 4 ( n 19 ) + 30 = 2 n 4 n 76 + 30 = 2 n 2 n = 46 n = 23 \begin{aligned} \Rightarrow 19 < n < 24 \quad \Rightarrow 4(n - 19) + 30 & = 2n \\ 4n - 76 + 30 & = 2n \\ 2n & = 46 \\ n & = \boxed{23} \end{aligned}

Moderator note:

I wonder, is there any other solution if we replace 2 n 2n with 3 n , 4 n , 5 n 3n,4n,5n and so on?

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