[math-fun] Taken, not stirred
You might be amused that the Fibonacci sequence made a cameo appearance last night on the SciFi Channel's "Steven Spielberg Presents Taken" mini-series (a well-produced junk-science UFO drama a la "X Files", "Close Encounters" etc). I wasn't quite following the random dialog, but it got my attention when one of the characters scribbled 1 1 2 5 8 13 on a pad and held it up, mentioning that each is the sum of the two previous. Then there was something about 55 (number of landing sites?) and finally they claim that there were exactly 46368 alien abductees, exulting "24th Fibonacci!"
Sudipta Das found square numbers 39866596 and 82355625, which are 11-complements. On my site, and here, I asked if anyone could prove anything about n-complements. "L.T. Pebody" <ltp1000@hermes.cam.ac.uk> rose to the challenge, and found a pretty amazing proof. It answers Sudipta's question, and makes the 39866596/82355625 pair all the more remarkable. Pebody's proof follows: --Ed Pegg Jr. Theorem: If x_1,x_2 are d-complementary squares with n digits, either: (1) n=1 and d is in 2,5,8,10,13,18 (2) n=3 and d is 6 (3) n is a power of 2 with n>2 and d is 11 Proof: Note 1: If x_1,x_2 are d-complementary squares with n digits, then 9x_1+9x_2 = d*(10^n-1) is the sum of two squares. Note 2: If n is an integer and p is a prime, then v(p,n) (the p-valuation of n) is the largest k such that p^k is a factor of n Note 3: A number n is the sum of two squares precisely if v(p,n) is even for all primes p such that 4|p+1 Theorem 1: For all primes p>3, there exists a prime p' with p'>p, p'>11 and 4|p'+1 such that v(p',10^p-1) is odd. Proof: 10^p-1 is equivalent to 3 modulo 4 and therefore is not the sum of two squares. Therefore, by note 3, there exists a prime p' with 4|p'+1 such that v(p',10^p-1) is odd. Note that v(3,10^k-1)=2+v(3,k). Therefore, since p is a prime greater than 3, v(3,10^p-1)=2 and p'>3. Note also that v(p',10^p-1) being odd means that p' is a factor of 10^p-1. Note that the integers k such that p' is a factor of 10^k-1 are precisely the multiples of the smallest such. Therefore the smallest such must be p (as p'>3 and so p' is not a factor of 10^1-1). However, p' is a factor of 10^(p'-1)-1, and so p is a factor of p'-1, and hence p'>p. Furthermore, p>=5 and p'-1>=2p, so p'>=11, with equality only if p=5. However, in this case p' is not a factor of 10^p-1, and hence p'>11. Corollary 2: If d*(10^n-1) is the sum of two squares with 2<=d<=18 then n can only have 2 or 3 as prime factors. PROOF Suppose otherwise, let p be the largest prime factor. Then by theorem 1, there exists p' with p'>p, p'>11 and 4|p'+1 such that v(p',10^p-1) is odd, say it is equal to 2k+1. Well n=pq, where all of q's prime factors are at most p and therefore less than p'. Then 10^p=1+(p'^(2k+1))a, where a is not divisble by p'. Then 10^n-1=(10^pq-1)=(1+(p'^(2k+1))a)^q-1=p'(2k+1)qa + p'(4k+2)b, for some integer b. Therefore v(p',10^n-1) is odd. Note that p' is a prime with 4|p'+1 and p'>11. Therefore p'>18 and v(p',d)=0. Therefore v(p',d*(10^n-1)) is odd, and d*(10^n-1) is not the sum of two squares. Theorem 3: If d*(10^n-1) is the sum of two squares with 2<=d<=18 and n divisible by 3 then n=3. I: n is not divisible by 9. (10^9-1)=333667*2997 and 333667 is prime. Therefore if n is divisble by 9, since dn is not divisible by 333667, the 333667-valuation of d(10^n-1) will be odd. Finally, since 4|1+333667, d(10^n-1) will not be the sum of two squares II: n=3. Otherwise, n=3*2^k with k>=1 Then (10^n-1)=(10^6-1)*(10^6+1)*(10^12+1)*...*(10^(n/2)+1). Since 10^6+1, 10^12+1 and so on are all sums of two squares, d(10^n-1) is the sum of two squares iff d(10^6-1) is. However d(10^6-1)=d*(3*7*11)*(48^2+45^2). Therefore, d(10^6-1) is the sum of two squares if d*3*7*11 is. However, such a d would have to be divisible by 3,7 and 11 and this is impossible. PROOF OF THEOREM From Theorem 3, either n=3 or n is a power of 2. The cases n=1,n=3 can be done by hand, producing the sets <1,1>,<1,4>,<4,4>,<1,9>,<4,9>,<9,9> and <225,441>. Now if n=2^k, d*(10^n-1)=d*11*9*(10^2+1)*(10^4+1)*...*(10^(n/2)+1). All of the multiplicative terms are sums of two squares except for d*11. Therefore d must be a multiple of 11, and within the range [2,18]. Therefore d=11. QED. OPEN QUESTION: ARE THERE ANY CASES WITH d=11 AND n!=8? If so, n>=1024. Argument to follow that probability is very unlikely.
participants (2)
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ed pegg -
Marc LeBrun