( p 1 ) th (p-1)^\text{th} Harmonic Number for Odd Prime p p

Let p p be an odd prime and A p B p = 1 + 1 2 + 1 3 + + 1 p 1 , \large \dfrac{A_p}{B_p}=1+\dfrac{1}{2}+\dfrac{1}{3}+\cdots +\dfrac{1}{p-1}, where A p A_p and B p B_p are coprime positive integers.

Enter the sum of all possible odd primes p 50 p\leq50 such that A p 0 ( m o d p ) A_p \equiv 0 \pmod{p} .


The answer is 326.

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1 solution

Kushal Bose
Jan 9, 2017

As p p is an odd prime so there are p 1 p-1 i.e. even numbers of terms are there.Now we will start grouping as follows -

1 k + 1 p k = p k ( p k ) \dfrac{1}{k} + \dfrac{1}{p-k}=\dfrac{p}{k(p-k)} where 0 k p 1 2 0 \leq k \leq \dfrac{p-1}{2} .

The above sum can be rearranged as

A p B p = k = 0 p 1 2 p k ( p k ) \dfrac{A_p}{B_p}=\displaystyle \sum_{k=0}^{\dfrac{p-1}{2}} \dfrac{p}{k(p-k)}

The numerator hwill have a factor p p and it will not cancel out by any factor of denominator because there is no factor p p contains in it (as p p is a prime).

So, A p A_p will be divisible by p p for every p < 50 p <50 .

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