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Curious congruences modulo $4$ involving primes

We define $$S(n)=\sum_{a=2+(n\pmod 2)}^{n-2} \sharp(\{j,1\leq j<n \pmod{a},(a,j)=1\})\ .$$ (Searching the OEIS yielded no results.) For $n>2$ we have the following experimental observations (...
Roland Bacher's user avatar
13 votes
1 answer
584 views

A congruence for a product of binomial coefficients?

For every prime $p\geq 5$ one seems to have the congruence $$(-1)^{(p-1)/2}\prod_{k=0}^{p-1}{p-1\choose k}\equiv 1-p+\frac{3}{2}p^2-\frac{7}{6}p^3\pmod{p^4}\ .$$ (I have checked all primes up to $5000$...
Roland Bacher's user avatar
0 votes
2 answers
132 views

Binomial congruence modulo prime [closed]

Let $a$, $b$ $(b≤a)$ be two positive integers are not twin primes and $p$ is any prime number. Is this congruence $$ \binom{a^p}{b^p} \equiv \binom{a}{b}^p \pmod{p} $$ valid?
Kelvin's user avatar
  • 15
5 votes
0 answers
541 views

Two conjectures for primes $p\equiv 1\pmod 8$

Motivated by my paper Quadratic residues and quartic residues modulo primes [Int. J. Number Theory 16 (2020), 1833-1858], here I pose two new conjectures for primes $p\equiv1\pmod8$ based on my ...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
6 votes
1 answer
576 views

Are there finitely many primes $x$ such that for a fixed odd prime $p$, $n=x^{p-1}+x^{p-2}+\dotsb + x+1$ is composite and $x \mid \phi(n)$?

Let \begin{equation} n =x^{p-1}+x^{p-2}+\dotsb + x+1 \end{equation} where $x$ and $p$ are odd primes. If $p$ is set to $5$, it appears $x=5$ is the only prime $x$ such that $n$ is composite and $x \...
ASP's user avatar
  • 319
1 vote
0 answers
138 views

The congruence $\mathrm{per}[|j-k|]_{1\le j,k\le p}\equiv-1/2\pmod p$ with $p$ an odd prime

For a matrix $[a_{j,k}]_{1\le j,k\le n}$, its permanent is given by $$\mathrm{per}[a_{j,k}]_{1\le j,k\le n}=\sum_{\tau\in S_n}\prod_{j=1}^na_{j,\tau(j)}.$$ Let $p$ be an odd prime. I have proved the ...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
5 votes
2 answers
348 views

Permutations $\pi\in S_{p-1}$ with $\frac1{\pi(1)\pi(2)}+\frac1{\pi(2)\pi(3)}+\cdots+\frac1{\pi(p-2)\pi(p-1)}+\frac1{\pi(p-1)\pi(1)}\equiv0\pmod{p^2}$

A well known congruence of Wolstenholme states that $$\frac1{1^2}+\frac1{2^2}+\cdots+\frac1{(p-1)^2}\equiv0\pmod{p}$$ for any prime $p>3$. For each $n=3,4,\ldots$ we clearly have $$\frac1{1\times2}+...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
12 votes
1 answer
838 views

Numbers $k$ with $\{\binom nk:\ n\in\mathbb N\}$ dense in $\mathbb Z_p$ for any prime $p\le k$

Let $k$ be a positive integer and let $p$ be a prime. In my 2011 PAMS paper joint with my former student W. Zhang [Proc. Amer. Math. Soc. 139(2011), 1569-1577], we studied when $$S(k)=\left\{\binom nk:...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
6 votes
0 answers
192 views

A conjecture involving $P_n=\prod_{k=1}^np_k$

For each positive integer $n$ let $P_n=\prod_{k=1}^n p_k$, where $p_k$ is the $k$th prime. Question. Is my following conjecture true? Conjecture. For any integer $n>1$, there are $k,m\in\{1,\...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
0 votes
0 answers
90 views

Set of primes $p_{1}\equiv 3 \bmod p_{2}$ such that $\phi(2^{\frac{{p_1}-3}{p_2}}-1)\equiv 0 \bmod p_1$ with $p_1,p_2\equiv 3\bmod 4$?

let $p_1$ and $p_2$ be positive primes such that $p_1,p_2 \equiv 3\bmod 4$ and $\phi$ is the Euler totiont function , I want to find the Set of primes $p_{1}\equiv 3 \bmod p_{2}$ such that $\phi(2^...
zeraoulia rafik's user avatar
4 votes
0 answers
142 views

Is it true that $|\{k^{k+1}+(k+1)^k\pmod p:\ k=0,\ldots,p-1\}|=(1-e^{-1})p+O(\sqrt{p})\ ?$

For each prime $p$, let us define $$w_p:=|\{k^{k+1}+(k+1)^k\pmod p:\ k=0,\ldots,p-1\}|,$$ where $a\pmod p$ denotes the residue class $a+p\mathbb Z$. Based on my computation, I conjecture that $$w_p=...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
7 votes
0 answers
213 views

Does Morley's congruence characterize primes greater than $3$?

In 1895 Morley showed that $$\binom{p-1}{(p-1)/2}\equiv(-1)^{\frac{p-1}2}4^{p-1}\pmod{p^3}$$ for any prime $p>3$. In 2009, I formulated the following conjecture concerning the converse of Morley's ...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
3 votes
0 answers
299 views

An attempt to get a variant of Agoh–Giuga conjecture

The idea of this post is an attempt to explore a variant of the so-called Agoh–Giuga conjecture. In past days, and today, I tried to think about variants of this conjecture exploring congruences about ...
user142929's user avatar
5 votes
1 answer
329 views

Reversing the CRT: Is $5$ tough?

Given odd primes $p\ne q$, by the CRT we can find an integer $x$ such that $x\equiv 2^{p-1}\pmod q$ and $x\equiv 2^{q-1}\pmod p$. Can this procedure be reversed? For which integers $x$ there exist ...
W-t-P's user avatar
  • 550
1 vote
0 answers
70 views

Wieferich primes and arithmetic prgressions

Let $p$ be an odd prime number. Let $K$ be a number field with Galois group $G$ and $H$ be a subgroup of $G$ stable under conjugation. Then the Cebotarev density theorem gives that $$\mathcal{L}=\{\...
Zakariae.B's user avatar
9 votes
1 answer
357 views

On the permanent $\text{per}[i^{j-1}]_{1\le i,j\le p-1}$ modulo $p^2$

Let $p$ be an odd prime. It is well-known that $$\det[i^{j-1}]_{1\le i,j\le p-1}=\prod_{1\le i<j\le p-1}(j-i)\not\equiv0\pmod p.$$ I'm curious about the behavior of the permanent $\text{per}[i^{j-...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
3 votes
2 answers
538 views

On the sum $\sum_{\pi\in S_{n}}e^{2\pi i\sum_{k=1}^{n}k\pi(k)/n}$

Motivated by Question 316142 of mine, I consider the new sum $$S(n):=\sum_{\pi\in S_{n}}e^{2\pi i\sum_{k=1}^{n}k\pi(k)/n}$$ for any positive integer $n$, where $S_n$ is the symmetric group of all the ...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
2 votes
1 answer
199 views

On the function $f_m(p)=\left|\left\{1\leqslant k<\frac p2:\ \left\{\frac{k^m}p\right\}>\frac12\right\}\right|$

Let $m>1$ be an integer and let $p$ be an odd prime. Can we say something nontrivial about $$f_m(p):=\left|\left\{1\leqslant k<\frac p2:\ \left\{\frac{k^m}p\right\}>\frac12\right\}\right|$$ (...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
38 votes
4 answers
7k views

What did Yu Jianchun discover about Carmichael numbers?

There's a news story going around (see for example [1]; other accounts are even more breathless) about an amateur mathematician, Yu Jianchun, finding an "alternative method to verify Carmichael ...
Charles's user avatar
  • 9,114
4 votes
3 answers
544 views

On a theorem of Hensel about congruence of binomial coefficient

In the paper Binomial coefficients modulo prime powers, Andrew Granville stated the following theorem: Let $n, m$ and $r=n-m$ be three given positive integer and $p^k$ is the exact power of $p$ ...
alphaomega's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
377 views

Cardinality of the prime divisor set of a k-power sum

Let $a_{1},\dots,a_{n}$ be positive natural numbers ($n>2$) such that $a_{i}\neq a_{j}$ if $i\neq j$. I want to prove that $$ \left\lvert \left\{ p \text{ prime} \; : \; p \mid \sum_{i=1}^n a_{i}^{...
peppo's user avatar
  • 45
22 votes
1 answer
1k views

Does $\binom{2n}{n} \equiv 2 \pmod p$ ever hold?

Well, the title does not tell the whole story; the complete question is: Are there any primes of the form $p=2n(n-1)+1$, with integer $n\ge 1$, such that $$ \binom{2n}{n} \equiv 2\pmod p ? $$ ...
Seva's user avatar
  • 23k