On a congruence involving harmonic series and Bernoulli numbers
Number Theory
2021-10-20 v1
Abstract
In 2003, Zhao discovered a curious congruence involving harmonic series and Bernoulli numbers: for any odd prime p, i,j,k≥1gcd(ijk,p)=1i+j+k=p∑ijk1≡−2Bp−3(modp), where Bn is the n-th Bernoulli number. This congruence was generalized by Wang and Cai in 2014, and Cai, Shen and Jia in 2017 by replacing the odd prime p in the summation and modulus with an odd prime power, and a product of two odd prime powers, respectively. In particular, Cai, Shen and Jia proposed a conjectural congruence: for any positive integer n with an odd prime factor p such that pr∥n where r≥1, i,j,k≥1gcd(ijk,n)=1i+j+k=n∑ijk1≡−2Bp−3⋅pn⋅prime q∣nq=p∏(1−q2)(1−q31)(modpr). In this paper, we establish the following generalization of their conjecture: for any positive integer n with an odd prime factor p such that pr∥n where r≥1, i,j,k≥1gcd(ijk,n)=1a1i+a2j+a3k=An∑ijk1≡−2Bp−3⋅pn⋅3Ag3(a12g121+a22g221+a32g321)×prime q∣nq=p∏(1−q2)(1−q31)(modpr), where a1, a2 and a3 are positive integers coprime to p, and A is a positive common multiple of a1, a2 and a3. Also, g1=gcd(a2,a3), g2=gcd(a3,a1), g3=gcd(a1,a2) and g=gcd(a1,a2,a3).
Cite
@article{arxiv.2110.09629,
title = {On a congruence involving harmonic series and Bernoulli numbers},
author = {Shane Chern},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2110.09629},
year = {2021}
}