How do you factor this?

There are three natural numbers n n for which n 2 7 n + 7 n^{2}-7n+7 is a perfect square . What's the sum of those three numbers n n ?

Hint : 28 = 49 21 28=49-21 .


The answer is 16.

This section requires Javascript.
You are seeing this because something didn't load right. We suggest you, (a) try refreshing the page, (b) enabling javascript if it is disabled on your browser and, finally, (c) loading the non-javascript version of this page . We're sorry about the hassle.

1 solution

Ismet Cosic
Jul 2, 2016

n 2 7 n + 7 = k 2 / × 4 n^{2}-7n+7 = k^{2} / \times 4

4 n 2 28 n + 28 = 4 k 2 4n^{2}-28n+28 = 4k^{2}

4 n 2 28 n + 49 ( 2 k ) 2 = 21 4n^{2}-28n + 49 - (2k)^{2} = 21

( 2 n 7 ) 2 ( 2 k ) 2 = 21 (2n-7)^{2} - (2k)^{2} = 21

( 2 n 7 2 k ) ( 2 n 7 + 2 k ) = 21 (2n-7-2k)(2n-7+2k)=21

21 factors to ±3 and ±7, and ±21 and ±1, so we can have four cases where we have sets of two linear equations. For example, one of the sets is:

2 n 7 2 k = 21 2n-7-2k=21

2 n 7 + 2 k = 1 2n-7+2k=1

By adding these two equations together, we get 4 n 14 = 22 = > n = 9 4n - 14 = 22 => n=9

The two other natural solutions are 1 and 6. Their sum is 1 + 6 + 9 = 16 \boxed{1+6+9=16}

In your 3rd line shouldn't 49 be positive

Kush Singhal - 4 years, 11 months ago

Log in to reply

yup, thanks for noticing, fixed it

ismet cosic - 4 years, 11 months ago

0 pending reports

×

Problem Loading...

Note Loading...

Set Loading...