Skip to main content

All Questions

Filter by
Sorted by
Tagged with
69 votes
1 answer
4k views

Iterations of $2^{n-1}+5$: the strong law of small numbers, or something bigger?

I've discovered what I believe is a quite remarkable sequence (A318970), defined by $$n_1 = 3,\qquad n_{k+1} = 2^{n_k-1}+5\quad(k\geq 1).$$ Here are the first four terms with their prime ...
Max Alekseyev's user avatar
49 votes
4 answers
4k views

Strange (or stupid) arithmetic derivation

Let us consider the following operation on positive integers: $$n=\prod_{i=1}^{k}p_i^{\alpha_i} \qquad f(n):= \prod_{i=1}^{k}\alpha_ip_i^{\alpha_i-1}$$ (Is it true that if we apply this operation to ...
Daniel Soltész's user avatar
26 votes
1 answer
3k views

A surprising conjecture about twin primes

Just for fun, I began to play with numbers of two distinct ciphers. I noticed that most of the cases if you consider the numbers $AB$ and $BA$ (written in base $10$), these have few common divisors: ...
Crostul's user avatar
  • 363
24 votes
1 answer
2k views

Parity of the multiplicative order of 2 modulo p

Let $\operatorname{ord}_p(2)$ be the order of 2 in the multiplicative group modulo $p$. Let $A$ be the subset of primes $p$ where $\operatorname{ord}_p(2)$ is odd, and let $B$ be the subset of primes $...
Shahab's user avatar
  • 429
15 votes
0 answers
487 views

Word complexity of primes mod 4

For an infinite binary word $w$, the word complexity $f_w(n)$ is defined as the number of different subwords of length $n$. The asymptotic behavior of this function is an important parameter of the ...
Igor Pak's user avatar
  • 17k
13 votes
1 answer
700 views

When is $\mathrm{gcd}(k,p^k-1)=1$ true?

Let $p$ be a prime. Is there a classification of the numbers $k \geq 1$ such that $\gcd(k,p^k-1)=1$? If not, can we at least produce an explicit infinite subset? What is known about these $k$? For the ...
Martin Brandenburg's user avatar
8 votes
1 answer
567 views

Arbitrarily many primes in a Fibonacci-type sequence

It is conjectured that the standard Fibonacci sequence contains infinitely many primes. While this is perhaps too difficult, I am wondering about the following simpler version: Question. For any $K$, ...
Xiaosheng Mu's user avatar
6 votes
1 answer
393 views

Test for pair of odd primes $(p, 2p^2-1)$

Let $a(n)$ be A106483 (i.e., primes $p$ such that $2p^2-1$ is also prime). Let $b(n)$ be an integer sequence such that $b(n) = B$ after the whole transformation where we start with $A = n$, $B = 1$, $...
Notamathematician's user avatar
5 votes
1 answer
172 views

On vanishing of $p$-adic logarithms

Might be related to Wieferich primes. Let $p$ be odd prime and define the Fermat quotient $$F(n)=\frac{(2^{n-1} -1)}{n} \mod n=\frac{(2^{n-1} \bmod n^2 )-1}{n}$$ For integer $b$ let $L_p(b)$ be the $p$...
joro's user avatar
  • 25.4k
5 votes
0 answers
161 views

Consecutive integers each of which has a large prime factor

There are many results about consecutive integers all having small prime factors. But what about consecutive integers each of which has a large prime factor? More precisely, let $P(n)$ be the ...
Penchez's user avatar
  • 341
5 votes
0 answers
176 views

Can the integers in an easily computable sequence free of prime numbers always be factored easily?

Call a sequence $(a_n)$ of positive integers easily computable if there is a constant $C$ and an algorithm which computes $a_n$ from $n$, $a_1, \dots, a_{n-1}$ and a finite number of integer ...
Stefan Kohl's user avatar
  • 19.6k
4 votes
1 answer
240 views

Do there exist prime numbers of the form $n \cdot 2^n + 1$, when $n \in \mathbb{N}$ and $n > 1$?

Recently, I was studying prime sequences of the form $k \cdot 2^n + 1$, and I noticed that primes of the form $n \cdot 2^n + 1$ almost do not exist, except for the $n = 1$ case. Are there other prime ...
Arsen Vardanyan's user avatar
4 votes
1 answer
219 views

Numbers $n$ whose representation as the product of two divisors require more digits than that of $n$

Note: Posting in MO since it was unanswered in MSE Let $f(x)$ be the number of digits in the decimal representation of $x$ e.g. $, f(0) = 1, f(1729) = 4$. If $n = ab$ then we can show that $f(ab) > ...
Nilotpal Kanti Sinha's user avatar
4 votes
1 answer
434 views

Quadratic progressions with very high prime density

In my previous MO question (see here), I solved the case for arithmetic progressions $f_k(x)=q_k x+1$. The solution is this: The list of sequences $f_k(x)$, each one corresponding to a specific $k$, ...
Vincent Granville's user avatar
4 votes
0 answers
306 views

How to explain this number-theoretic seeming “almost coincidence”?

For natural numbers $n\geq2$, let $d(n)$ be the number of divisors of $n$, and let \begin{equation} g(n)=n\sum_i r_i(p_i-1) \end{equation} where $n=\prod_i p_i^{r_i}$ is the factorisation of $n$ as a ...
Simon's user avatar
  • 141
4 votes
0 answers
178 views

Primitive roots modulo primes related to Fibonacci numbers or Lucas numbers

The Fibonacci numbers $F_0,F_1,F_2,\ldots$ and the Lucas numbers $L_0,L_1,L_2,\ldots$ are given by $$F_0=0,\ F_1=1,\ \text{and}\ F_{n+1}=F_n+F_{n-1}\ (n=1,2,3,\ldots)$$ and $$L_0=2,\ L_1=1,\ \text{...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
3 votes
1 answer
2k views

What do we know about Lucky numbers?

I'm really fascinated by lucky numbers (Wikipedia; OEIS A000959) and their prime-like characteristics. Wolfram states: write "out all odd numbers: 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, 17, 19, .... The ...
Happydugongo's user avatar
3 votes
3 answers
696 views

For any prime $p$, is there $C$ such that if $x\ge C$, then all but one integer among $x+1, x+2, \dots, x+p$ has Greatest Prime Factor $> p$

I apologize if this is a naive question about greatest prime factors (gpf). I was thinking about the sequence of integers where $\mathrm{gpf}(x) \le p$ where $p$ is any prime. Clearly, as $x$ ...
Larry Freeman's user avatar
2 votes
2 answers
197 views

On the primality of $j(n)=\varphi(p_n+1-n)+1$ when $j(n) \equiv 19 \pmod {100}$

Related to Power of primes. Let $p_n$ denote n-th prime and $\varphi$ the totient function. For natural $n$, define $j(n)=\varphi(p_n+1-n)+1$. For $n$ up to $10^9$ if $j(n) \equiv 19 \pmod {100}$ then ...
joro's user avatar
  • 25.4k
2 votes
1 answer
220 views

Euler quotients modulo $n$

For odd integer $n$, define the Euler quotient modulo $n$ to be $a(n)$: $$ a(n)=\frac{(2^{\phi(n)}-1) \bmod n^2}{n}=\frac{2^{\phi(n)}-1}{n} \bmod n$$ $a(n)=0$ for OEIS sequence Wieferich numbers ...
joro's user avatar
  • 25.4k
2 votes
1 answer
154 views

GCD for two Cullen numbers

The $n$'th Cullen number is $C_n = n\cdot2^n+1$. If $m$ and $n$ are natural numbers, what can one say about $\gcd(C_n,C_m)$, where $m$ and $n$ are different positive integers?
dalibor's user avatar
  • 21
2 votes
0 answers
76 views

upper and lower bounds on rowlands sequence

rowlands sequence is defined as follows \begin{equation} a_{n}=a_{n-1} + b_{n} \end{equation} where $b_{n} = gcd(a_{n-1}, n)$ for $n>h$ it originates from E. Rowlands 2008 paper "A Natural ...
Antisocialfreal's user avatar
2 votes
0 answers
157 views

Conjecture: $x^4+1$ is never Wieferich prime

Related to this question and Alexander Kalmynin's answer. For natural $n$ define $J(n)=(2^{n-1}-1) \bmod n^2$ and if $n$ is power of two define $J(2^n)=1$ (this is artificial, just to avoid triviality ...
joro's user avatar
  • 25.4k
2 votes
0 answers
199 views

Not a twin prime pair test using $\gcd$ only

Let $m$ be an odd positive integer such that $m=2k+1$, $k\in\mathbb{N}$. Let $v$ be a vector of $n$ positive integers. Let $v(i)$ be the $i$-th element of the vector. Then we start with $v(i)=m(i+1)-2$...
Notamathematician's user avatar
2 votes
0 answers
108 views

How to compute/estimate the least $k$ such that there exist $n$ consecutive integers each having a prime factor $\le k$?

Let $a_n$ be the least integer $k$ such that there exist $n$ consecutive integers each with a prime factor $\le k$. For example, $a_{13} \le 11$ because the 13 consecutive integers $114,115,\ldots,126$...
tuna's user avatar
  • 523
2 votes
0 answers
326 views

Why can one compute the sum of divisors of $n$ without factoring $n$?

Question links to paper which states: $$ \sigma(n)= \frac{6}{n^2(n-1)}\sum_{k=1}^{n-1}(3n^2-10k^2)\sigma(k)\sigma(n-k) \qquad (1) $$ where $\sigma(n)$ is the sum of divisors of $n$. Another similar ...
joro's user avatar
  • 25.4k
2 votes
0 answers
311 views

A question concerning the strange arithmetic derivation

This question is related to Strange (or stupid) arithmetic derivation. The original question whether an unbounded sequence of iterates exists is still unanswered. $$n=\prod_{i=1}^{k}p_i^{\alpha_i} \...
István Kovács's user avatar
1 vote
1 answer
181 views

On the sequence $a(n)=\gcd(2^n-1,\phi(2^n-1))$

For natural $n$, define the sequence $$ a(n)=\gcd(2^n-1,\phi(2^n-1)) $$ It doesn't appear to be in OEIS and starts $1,1,1,1,9,1,1,1,3,1,9,1,3,1,1,1,27,1,75,49$ Q1 Can we unconditionally prove $a(n)=1$...
joro's user avatar
  • 25.4k
1 vote
0 answers
102 views

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
1 vote
0 answers
60 views

On the parity of $(2^{\varphi(n)}-1) \bmod{n^2}$

For odd integer $n$ define the function $$ J(n)=(2^{\varphi(n)}-1) \bmod{n^2}$$ $J(n)$ is integer in $[0,n^2-1]$ and it is divisible by $n$. Integer $n$ is Wieferich number iff $J(n)=0$ and if $n$ is ...
joro's user avatar
  • 25.4k
1 vote
0 answers
153 views

A definition related to pseudoprimes and the Dedekind psi function

In this post we consider that $\psi(k)$ denotes the Dedekind psi function. Wikipedia has an artcle dedicated to this arithmetic function Dedekind psi function defined for a positive integers $m>1$ ...
user142929's user avatar
1 vote
0 answers
151 views

On smoothness and roughness of a number related to triangular numbers

Define $\triangle_n$ to be the $n$th triangular number. Define $$M_n=(2\triangle_n-1)2\triangle_n(2\triangle_n+1)=2\triangle_n(4\triangle_n^2-1).$$ Define $(\ell,k)$-smough numbers to be numbers that ...
VS.'s user avatar
  • 1,826
1 vote
0 answers
223 views

Does each prime $p>3$ have a quadratic nonresidue which is a Mersenne number?

Recall that the Mersenne numbers are those integers $M_p=2^p-1$ with $p$ prime. QUESTION: Is it true that for each prime $p>3$ there is a Mersenne number which is a quadratic nonresidue modulo $p$?...
Zhi-Wei Sun's user avatar
  • 15.6k
0 votes
1 answer
104 views

Non-Wieferich primes with Euler quotient modulo $p$ two and alternating harmonic numbers

Let $b(n)$ denote the Euler quotient modulo $n$. In OEIS we have A128465 Numbers k such that k divides the numerator of alternating Harmonic number H'((k+1)/2) For $n>1$ we have $b(A128465(n))=2$. ...
joro's user avatar
  • 25.4k
0 votes
1 answer
492 views

New experiments involving Ramanujan primes: Benford's law

I know that in the literature there are interesting articles involving the sequence of Ramanujan primes, I refer the Ramanujan Prime from the online encyclopedia Wolfram MathWorld. This week I ...
user142929's user avatar
0 votes
0 answers
110 views

What will be the set of non-Wieferich numbers if the set of non-Wieferich primes is finite?

Integer $n$ is Wieferich number if $2^{\phi(n)}-1 \equiv 0 \pmod {n^2}$. Wieferich prime is Wieferich number with $n$ prime. It is an open problem if there are infinitely many Wieferich primes and ...
joro's user avatar
  • 25.4k