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Combinatorial Number Theory (Teachers Edition)

Gabriel Carroll MOP 2010 (Blue)


Combinatorial number theory refers to combinatorics avored with the rich juicy arithmetical structure of the integers. At the elementary level, like many other areas of combinatorics, combinatorial number theory doesnt require a lot of deep theorems; instead its a big hodgepodge of ideas and tricks. A few notational conventions are useful, in particular in stating additive problems. If A and B are sets of integers, we often write A + B for the set {a + b | a A, b B }. For c a constant, we often write A + c for {a + c | a A} and cA = {ca | a A}. Also, if we are interested in sums or products of generic sets of integers, the sum of the empty set is generally taken to be 0, and the product of the empty set is 1.

Problem-solving techniques

For the most part, the ideas that are useful in solving combinatorial number theory problems are the same ones that are useful in other areas of combinatorics. Use the pigeonhole principle (or probabilistic methods) Use induction Use greedy algorithms Look at prime factorizations and the divisibility lattice Look at largest or smallest elements Think about orders of magnitude Count things in two ways Look at things mod n, for conveniently chosen n Transform things to make them convenient to work with Dont be afraid of case analysis and brute force

Use generating functions or similar algebraic techniques Translate the problem into graph theory Use actual number theory

Problems
1. Determine whether or not there exists an increasing sequence a1 , a2 , . . . of positive integers with the following property: for any integer k , only nitely many of the numbers a1 + k, a2 + k, . . . are prime. on 09 handout 2. [BMC, 1999] The set of positive integers is partitioned into nitely many subsets. Show that some subset S has the following property: for every positive integer n, S contains innitely many multiples of n. 3. Given is a list of n positive integers whose sum is less than 2n. Prove that, for any positive integer m not exceeding the sum of these integers, one can choose a sublist of the integers whose sum is m. greedy 4. Let S be an innite set of integers, such that every nite subset of S has a common divisor greater than 1. Show that all the elements of S have a common divisor greater than 1. 5. Show that any positive integer can be expressed as a sum of terms of the form 2a 3b , where a, b are nonnegative integers, and no term is divisible by any other. take powers of 3 greedily; if the number is even, divide by 2 and use induction 6. [Canada, 2000] Given are 2000 integers, each one having absolute value at most 1000, and such that their sum equals 1. Prove that we can choose some of the integers so that their sum equals 0. order them so that the sum of each sublist is in [2000, 1999], then pigeonhole 7. [Paul Erd os] Show that if n + 1 numbers are chosen from the set {1, 2, . . . , 2n}, then one of these numbers divides another. 8. [BAMO, 2009] A set S of positive integers is magic if for any two distinct members i, j S , (i + j )/ gcd(i, j ) is also in S . Find all nite magic sets. cant have two coprime numbers, else we generate innitely many numbers. let a, b be the smallest two numbers. so (a + b)/(a, b) <= (a + b)/2 hence it equals a, from which b = a2 a. if theres another number c, then likewise (a + c)/(a, c) = a (impossible) or b; the latter gives a|c so c = a3 a2 a. then (b+c)/(b, c) = d = a2 2, 2

then b, d give e = a2 (a+2)/2. now keep averaging b, e, etc. and get a contradiction. so only such sets are {a, a2 a}. 9. [IMO, 1991] Let n > 6 be an integer with the following property: all the integers in {1, 2, . . . , n 1} that are relatively prime to n form an arithmetic progression. Prove that n is either prime or a power of 2. let d be the dierence of the progression. if d 3 then 3 | n, so 3 | d, but then d + 1 or 2d + 1 is divisible by 3, contradicting coprimality. so d = 1 (n prime) or d = 2 (n a power of 2). 10. [USAMO, 1998] Prove that, for each integer n 2, there is a set S of n integers such that ab is divisible by (a b)2 for all distinct a, b S . 11. [Reid Barton] Let a1 < a2 < be an increasing sequence of positive integers, such that an+1 an < 1000000 for all n. Prove that there exist indices i < j such that aj is divisible by ai . 12. [China, 2009] Find all pairs of distinct nonzero integers (a, b) such that there exists a set S of integers with the following property: for any integer n, exactly one of n, n + a, n + b is in S . answer: (kc, kd) where c, d 1, 2 mod 3 in some order. we can reduce to the case a, b coprime. if theyre 1, 2 mod 3 then just take the set of numbers that are 0 mod 3. lets show this is necessary. for x S we have x + (b a), x + b / S so x +(2b a) S , likewise x +(2a b) S . if gcd(2a b, 2b a) = 1 then everythings in S , which is bad. but the gcd is at most 3, possible only if a, b are 1, 2 mod 3 in some order. 13. [APMC, 1990] Let a1 , . . . , ar be integers such that iI ai = 0 for every nonempty set I {1, . . . , r}. Prove that the positive integers can be partitioned into a nite number of classes so that, whenever n1 , . . . , nr are integers from the same class, a1 n1 + + ar nr = 0. let p be a prime not dividing any partial sum; class them according to their last nonzero digit in base p 14. [IMO, 2003] Let S = {1, 2, . . . , 106 }. Prove that for any A S with 101 elements, we can nd B S with 100 elements such that the sums a + b, for a A and b B , are all dierent. as long as |B | < 100 we can nd another element to put in B without creating new collisions. proof: only 9999 sums exist so far, and each could create a collision for at most 100 of the values of b not already used. 15. [Russia, 1998] A sequence a1 , a2 , . . . of positive integers contains each positive integer exactly once. Moreover, for every pair of distinct positive integers m and

n,

1 |an am | < < 1998. 1998 |n m |

Show that |an n| < 2000000 for all n. if an is ever 2000000 below n, there must be 2000000 numbers above it that have been visited. from the highest visited number to the next number is more than 2000 steps, impossible. if an is ever 2000000 above n then there are 2000000 numbers that havent been visited. from the number below the lowest non-visited number to the lowest non-visited number is more than 2000 steps, impossible. 16. [Schurs Theorem] For any positive integer k , there exists an N with the following property: if the integers 1, 2, . . . , N are colored in k colors, then there exist some three integers a, b, c of the same color such that a + b = c. ramsey theory proof 17. [China, 2009] Let a, b, m, n be positive integers with a m < n < b. Prove that there exists a nonempty subset S of {ab, ab + 1, ab + 2, . . . , ab + a + b} such that ( xS x)/mn is the square of a rational number. want to prove we can connect all the numbers a, . . . , b 1 by a path a, b 1, a +1, b 2, . . . (which may repeat entries) such that the product of two successive numbers is in ab, . . . , ab + a + b. if at any step we cant condense further, the last two numbers were a + k, b j for (a + k +1)(b j ) > ab + a + b and (a + k )(b j 1) < ab. subtracting gives k j > 1, but then (a + k )(b j ) = ab + b(k j ) + (b a k )j ab + 2b is already greater than ab + a + b. 18. [IMO Shortlist, 1990] The set of positive integers is partitioned into nitely many subsets. Prove that there exists some subset, say Ai , and some integer m with the following property: for any k , there exist numbers a1 < a2 < < ak in Ai , with aj +1 aj m for each j . let A1 , . . . , An be the subsets. if none has the desired property, show by induction that Ai An contains arbitrarily long sequences of consecutive numbers. 19. [St. Petersburg, 1996] The numbers 1, 2, . . . , 2n are divided into 2 sets of n numbers. For each set, we consider all n2 possible sums a + b, where a, b are in that set (and may be equal). Each sum is reduced mod 2n. Show that the n2 remainders from one set are equal, in some order, to the n2 remainders from the other set. generating functions: A2 B 2 divisible by x2n 1 20. [IMO Shortlist, 1999] Let A be a set of N residues mod N 2 . Prove that there exists a set B of N residues mod N 2 such that the set A + B contains at least half of all residues mod N 2 .

successively choose elements of B , we can always cover at least N/2 new sums by pigeonhole (each of the N 2 /2 new sums can be covered by one of N dierent choices of new element, and fewer than N 2 choices of new element are available) 21. [IMO shortlist, 1999] Let x and y be odd integers with |x| = |y |. Suppose that the positive integers have been colored in four dierent colors. Show that there exist two dierent numbers of the same color whose dierence is equal to x, y , x + y , or x y. 22. [Erd os-Selfridge] For any set A of positive integers, let A (n) be the number of ways of writing n as a sum of two distinct members of A. If two dierent sets A and B have the property that A (n) = B (n) for all positive integers n, prove that the number of elements in each set is a power of 2. let a, b be the generating functions for the two sets and f their dierence. we get f (x2 ) = f (x)g (x) for some poly g . factor out some power of x 1, and were left with h(x2 )(x + 1)n = h(x)g (x) where h(1) = 0. plug in x = 1 and divide through to get g (1) = 2n , which gives what we needed. 23. [Bulgaria, 2000] Let p 3 be a prime number, and a1 , . . . , ap2 a sequence of integers such that, for each i, neither ai nor ai i 1 is a multiple of p. Prove that there exists some collection of distinct terms whose product is congruent to 2 mod p. actually every product is achievable. proof: let Sk be the set of all products of subsets of the rst k terms, mod p. check that |Sk | > k by induction each time we include a new term, its order isnt a factor of k , so if we had exactly k before then we cant keep the same set. 24. [IMO, 2009] Let a1 , a2 , . . . , an be distinct positive integers and let M be a set of n 1 positive integers not containing s = a1 + a2 + + an . A grasshopper is to jump along the real axis, starting at the point 0 and making n jumps to the right with lengths a1 , a2 , . . . , an in some order. Prove that the order can be chosen in such a way that the grasshopper never lands on any point in M . induction. let m be the largest element of M and a1 < < an . if s an M and less than m, theres some i such that s ai and s ai an are both not in M , so apply the induction hypothesis to all the elements except ai , an , then jump by an and then ai . otherwise, use the induction hypothesis on a1 , . . . , an1 to avoid landing at any element of M except possibly m. if we never land at m were home free. otherwise, take the preceding hop, replace it with an , and then ll in the remaining hops. 25. [Van der Waerdens Theorem] For any positive integers k and m, there exists N with the following property: if the integers 1, 2, . . . , N are colored in k colors, there exists an arithmetic progression of length m, all of whose members are the same color. 5

multidimensional grid proof induction on length of progresssions, proving for all values of k simultaneously

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