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XIII OBM

Brazil counting and probability

Problem

Show that there is a number of the form (with 9s) with which is divisible by .
Solution
There are many ways to solve the problem, using, for instance, Euler-Fermat theorem. But one student, André Reys Leal, obtained a clever, simple solution: consider all numbers of the form with more than two nines. If one of them is multiple of we are done. If not, since there are infinite of them there are two that are the same modulo . By subtracting them, we obtain , which is a multiple of . We may ignore all rightmost zeros, but we do keep three of them, obtaining , which is still a multiple of . Sum to it and we are done.

Techniques

Pigeonhole principleGreatest common divisors (gcd)Fermat / Euler / Wilson theorems