How many ordered triples are there such that
(i) are positive, pairwise coprime integers,
(ii) , and
(iii) each of divides the sum of the other two integers?
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We have that
(I) a + b ≡ 0 m o d c ⟹ a + b + c ≡ 0 m o d c ,
(II) a + c ≡ 0 m o d b ⟹ a + b + c ≡ 0 m o d b , and
(III) b + c ≡ 0 m o d a ⟹ a + b + c ≡ 0 m o d a .
These imply that a + b + c ≡ 0 m o d a b c ⟹ a + b + c ≥ a b c .
Now look at the options for a . If a = 1 then we have that
1 + b + c ≥ b c ⟹ b ≤ c − 1 c + 1 for c = 1 .
For a = b = c = 1 we have all of conditions (i), (ii) and (iii) being met, so ( 1 , 1 , 1 ) is one solution triple. If c = 2 then we would require, (with a = 1 ), that b ≤ 3 − 1 3 + 1 = 3 , but since we also require that b ≤ c this limit us to either b = 1 or b = 2 . Now the triple ( 1 , 1 , 2 ) satisfies all of (i), (ii) and (iii), and is thus a solution triple, but ( 1 , 2 , 2 ) does not satisfy condition (iii).
If c = 3 then b ≤ 3 − 1 3 + 1 = 2 . This gives us the possible solution triples ( 1 , 1 , 3 ) and ( 1 , 2 , 3 ) , only the second of which satisfies all of the original conditions.
So for a = 1 we have the 3 solution triples ( 1 , 1 , 1 ) , ( 1 , 1 , 2 ) and ( 1 , 2 , 3 ) .
If a = 2 then 2 + b + c ≤ 2 b c ⟹ c ≤ 2 b − 1 b + 2 . Now since we must have a ≤ b we start by looking at the case b = 2 . This implies that c ≤ 3 4 , i.e., that c = 1 , since c must be an integer. But this violates the condition that b ≤ c , and so b = 2 . For b = 3 we would require that c ≤ 1 , again violating the condition that b ≤ c . For b > 3 we would require that c < 1 , which has no positive integer solution.
For a = 3 we would require that c ≤ 3 b − 1 b + 3 , which, since we would require that b ≥ 3 , would require that c < 1 . This will be the case for any a ≥ 3 , so the only solution triples are those we found with a = 1 .
We thus conclude that there are 3 solution triples.