Related papers: On Power Values of Sum of Divisors function in Ari…

Let $s(n):= \sum_{d\mid n,~d<n} d$ denote the sum of the proper divisors of $n$. It is natural to conjecture that for each integer $k\ge 2$, the equivalence \[ \text{$n$ is $k$th powerfree} \Longleftrightarrow \text{$s(n)$ is $k$th…

We answer a number of questions of Erd\H{o}s on the existence of arithmetic progressions in $k$-full numbers (i.e. integers with the property that every prime divisor necessarily occurs to at least the $k$-th power). Further, we deduce a…

We find upper bounds that are sharp for the number of $k$th powers inside arbitrary arithmetic progressions whose step has $O(1)$ many divisors.

This paper investigates the dynamics of the iterated sum-of-divisors function $\sigma_k(m)$ and its behaviour modulo $m$, motivated by classical questions on perfect and multiperfect numbers and by the congruences $\sigma_k(m) \equiv 0…

The problem of finding the sum of a polynomial's values is considered. In particular, for any $n\geq 3$, the explicit formula for the sum of the $n$th powers of natural numbers $S_n=\sum_{x=1}^{m}x^{n}$ is proved:…

Fix a positive real number $\theta$. The natural numbers $m$ with largest square-free divisor not exceeding $m^\theta$ form a set $\mathscr{A}$, say. It is shown that whenever $\theta>1/2$ then all large natural numbers $n$ are the sum of…

A natural number is a binary $k$'th power if its binary representation consists of $k$ consecutive identical blocks. We prove an analogue of Waring's theorem for sums of binary $k$'th powers. More precisely, we show that for each integer $k…

We study divisibility properties of certain sums and alternating sums involving binomial coefficients and powers of integers. For example, we prove that for all positive integers $n_1,..., n_m$, $n_{m+1}=n_1$, and any nonnegative integer…

A positive integer n is said to be perfect if sigma(n)=2n, where sigma denotes the sum of the divisors of n. In this article, we show that if n is an even perfect number, then any integer m<=n is expressed as a sum of some of divisors of n.

In a recent paper the authors studied the denominators of polynomials that represent power sums by Bernoulli's formula. Here we extend our results to power sums of arithmetic progressions. In particular, we obtain a simple explicit…

We study the equation $(x-4r)^3 + (x-3r)^3 + (x-2r)^3+(x-r)^3 + x^3 + (x+r)^3+(x+2r)^3 + (x+3r)^3 + (x+4r)^3 = y^p$, which is a natural continuation of previous works carried out by A. Arg\'{a}ez-Garc\'{i}a and the fourth author (perfect…

We prove effective finiteness results concerning polynomial values of the sums $$ b^k +\left(a+b\right)^k + \cdots + \left(a\left(x-1\right) + b\right)^k $$ and $$ b^k - \left(a+b\right)^k + \left(2a+b\right)^k - \ldots + (-1)^{x-1}…

A perfect number is a number whose divisors add up to twice the number itself. The existence of odd perfect numbers is a millennia-old unsolved problem. This note proposes a proof of the nonexistence of odd perfect numbers. More generally,…

We determine all triples $(a,b,n)$ of positive integers such that $a$ and $b$ are relatively prime and $n^k$ divides $a^n + b^n$ (respectively, $a^n - b^n$), when $k$ is the maximum of $a$ and $b$ (in fact, we answer a slightly more general…

Gerard and Washington proved that, for $k > -1$, the number of primes less than $x^{k+1}$ can be well approximated by summing the $k$-th powers of all primes up to $x$. We extend this result to primes in arithmetic progressions: we prove…

Let $A$ be a finite set of integers. We show that if $k$ is a prime power or a product of two distinct primes then $$|A+k\cdot A|\geq(k+1)|A|-\lceil k(k+2)/4\rceil$$ provided $|A|\geq (k-1)^{2}k!$, where $A+k\cdot A=\{a+kb:\ a,b\in A\}$. We…

For any fixed $k\geq 2$, we prove that every sufficiently large integer can be expressed as the sum of a $k$th power of a prime and a number with at most $M(k)=6k$ prime factors. For sufficiently large $k$ we also show that one can take…

We present a novel conjecture concerning the additive representation of natural numbers using prime powers. Based on extensive computational verification, we conjecture that every integer n > 23 can be expressed as a sum of at most five…

The divisor function $\sigma(n)$ sums the divisors of $n$. We call $n$ abundant when $\sigma(n) - n > n$ and perfect when $\sigma(n) - n = n$. I recently introduced the recursive divisor function $a(n)$, the recursive analog of the divisor…

Let $k$ be a natural number and let $c=2.134693\ldots$ be the unique real solution of the equation $2c=2+\log (5c-1)$ in $[1,\infty)$. Then, when $s\ge ck+4$, we establish an asymptotic lower bound of the expected order of magnitude for the…