Don't use modulo here!

Find the number of integers n 3 n \neq 3 such that n 3 n 3 3 n-3|n^3-3 .


The answer is 16.

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4 solutions

Chris Galanis
Oct 12, 2015

Let n 3 3 n 3 = k Z \large{\frac{n^3-3}{n-3} = k \in \mathbb{Z}} . Then: n 3 9 n 2 + 27 n 27 + 9 n 2 27 n + 27 3 n 3 = k Z ( n 3 ) 3 + 9 n ( n 3 ) + 24 n 3 = k Z 24 n 3 = k ( n 3 ) 2 9 n Z {\Rightarrow \frac{n^3 -9n^2 + 27n -27 +9n^2 - 27n + 27 -3}{n-3} = k \in \mathbb{Z} \\ \Rightarrow \frac{(n-3)^3 +9n(n-3) +24}{n-3} = k \in \mathbb{Z} \\ \Rightarrow \frac{24}{n-3} = k - (n-3)^2 -9n\in \mathbb{Z} } Which means that n 3 24 n-3|24 , thus n 3 n-3 is a divisor of 24 24 . Hence: ( n 3 ) { ± 1 , ± 2 , ± 3 , ± 4 , ± 6 , ± 8 , ± 12 , ± 24 } n { 21 , 9 , 5 , 3 , 1 , 0 , 1 , 2 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 9 , 11 , 15 , 27 } {(n-3) \in \big\{\pm1, \pm2, \pm3, \pm 4, \pm6, \pm8, \pm12, \pm24\big\} \\ \Rightarrow \boxed{n \in \Big\{-21, -9, -5, -3, -1, 0, 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 11, 15, 27\Big\}}}

I just got saved in the third try. Didn't notice negative integers! :P

Rohit Ner - 5 years, 8 months ago

Exactly Same Way.

Kushagra Sahni - 5 years, 8 months ago

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Kushagra, Thanks for resharing all the nicest problems.

Dev Sharma - 5 years, 8 months ago

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My Pleasure Mate.

Kushagra Sahni - 5 years, 8 months ago

Break it into n^3-27/n-3. + 30/n-3 . Now n-3|30 . No. Of integer factors of 30=2^4 =16

Aakash Khandelwal - 5 years, 8 months ago

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Do you actually mean: n 3 3 n 3 = n 3 27 + 24 n 3 = ( n 3 ) ( n 2 + 3 n + 9 ) + 24 n 3 = n 2 + 3 n + 9 + 24 n 3 Z \frac{n^3-3}{n-3} =\frac{n^3-27+24}{n-3} =\frac{(n-3)(n^2+3n+9)+24}{n-3} =n^2+3n+9+\frac{24}{n-3} \in \mathbb{Z} ( n 3 ) 24 \Rightarrow (n-3)|24

Which is the same thing but faster! Thanks!!!

Chris Galanis - 5 years, 8 months ago
Josh Banister
Oct 14, 2015

Let a = n 3 a = n-3 . Now we just need values of integer a a such that a ( a + 3 ) 3 3 a | (a+3)^3 - 3 . Since a a divides all the a a terms after expansion of the polynomial, we only need a a such that a 24 a|24 . There are 16 values of a a that satisfy this and none of them are a = 0 a=0 so the answer is 16 16 .

Kostub Deshmukh
Oct 19, 2015

A simpler way to solve this:

We know that a b a 3 b 3 a-b\mid a^3-b^3 since a 3 b 3 = ( a b ) ( a 2 + a b + b 2 ) a^3 - b^3 = (a-b)(a^2+ab+b^2)

So we get n 3 n 3 27 n-3 \mid n^3 - 27 for all integers n 3 n \ne 3 . We can rewrite n 3 3 n^3-3 as ( n 3 27 ) + 24 (n^3 - 27) + 24 . We know that n 3 n-3 divides the first term and for n 3 n -3 to divide the whole expression we must have: n 3 24 n-3\mid 24

24 has 8 factors and since we are looking for integers we include the negative factors, we have the answer as 16.

Given n 3 n 3 3 n-3 | n^3 - 3 but the polynomial division leaves a remainder of 24 n 3 \frac{24}{n-3} with quotient n 2 + 3 n + 9 n^2+3n+9 .

Note This is easy to see as n 2 27 n^2 - 27 is the closest polynomial from n 2 3 n^2-3 that is divisible by n-3

So this problem reduces to finding all n Z n \in \mathbb{Z} such that n 3 24 n 3 2 3 3 1 n - 3\mid 24 \Rightarrow n - 3 \mid 2^3 \bullet 3^1

So no of integers = 2 ( 3 + 1 ) ( 1 + 1 ) = 2 \bullet (3+1) \bullet (1+1)

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