Homepage Solution manuals Ivan Niven An Introduction to the Theory of Numbers Exercise 2.1.53 (There are infinitely many $n$ such that $n!-1$ is divisible by at least two distinct primes)

Exercise 2.1.53 (There are infinitely many $n$ such that $n!-1$ is divisible by at least two distinct primes)

Show that there are infinitely many n such that n ! 1 is divisible by at least two distinct primes.

Answers

Proof. The solution is similar to Exercise 37.

Take n = p 2 , where p > 5 is a prime number (there are infinitely many such integers n ). By Exercise 52, p n ! 1 = ( p 2 ) ! + 1 , and n ! 1 = ( p 2 ) ! + 1 > 1 is not a power of p . Therefore n ! 1 has two prime factors, p and another prime factor, otherwise n ! + 1 = p k is a power of p .

There exist infinitely many n such that n ! 1 is divisible by at least two distinct primes. □

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2024-08-05 10:13
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