Zeroes all around

Find the smallest positive integer n n such that n ! n! has 290 trailing zeroes.


The answer is 1170.

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2 solutions

Akshat Sharda
Nov 24, 2015

290 = n 5 + n 5 2 + n 5 3 + 290=\left \lfloor \frac{n}{5} \right \rfloor+ \left \lfloor \frac{n}{5^2} \right \rfloor+ \left \lfloor \frac{n}{5^3} \right \rfloor+\ldots

290 = n 5 1 1 5 290=\frac{\frac{n}{5}}{1-\frac{1}{5}}

290 = n 4 n = 1160 290=\frac{n}{4}\Rightarrow n=1160

Now we can see that number of zeroes in 1160 ! = 288 1160!=288 .

Therefore to get two more zeroes (i.e. 290 290 zeroes) the answer must be 1170 \boxed{1170} .

I never thought of evaluating the infinite limit of that sum. At least it gives a more reasonable and close approximation quicker. Thanks for sharing!

Kay Xspre - 5 years, 6 months ago

Can somebody please explain a little why this approach is working?

Patrick Engelmann - 5 years, 6 months ago

Same method! Although in the first step I miscalculated it as 1060 so it took me time.

Shreyash Rai - 5 years, 6 months ago
Kay Xspre
Nov 24, 2015

We will have to evaluate the range of possible value of n n , using i = 1 l o g 5 n n 5 i \sum_{i=1}^{\left \lfloor log_5n \right \rfloor} \left \lfloor \frac{n}{5^i} \right \rfloor For n = 1100 n = 1100 , these sum will be 220 + 44 + 8 + 1 = 273 220+44+8+1 = 273 and for n = 1200 n = 1200 , these sum will be 240 + 48 + 9 + 1 = 298 240+48+9+1 = 298 . Given we need n ! n! with at least 290 trailing zeros, we can conclude that 1100 < n < 1200 1100 < n < 1200 . When we shift n = 1150 n = 1150 , the sum will be 230 + 46 + 9 + 1 = 286 230+46+9+1 = 286 . From here, every increment of 5 will add one more zero. We then add four 5s (=20), then we will get the sum of 234 + 46 + 9 + 1 = 290 234+46+9+1 = 290 , satisfying the requirement, hence, n = 1170 n=1170

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