2021 JMPSC Accuracy Problems/Problem 15
Problem
For all positive integers define the function
to output
For example,
,
, and
Find the last three digits of
Solution
We can easily find that and so on. Thus, we claim
that
Now, we find we can easily find that
We proceed by induction. Our base case is
Our inductive assumption is
and we wish to prove that this pattern holds for
We can easily find that Using our inductive assumption, we obtain
as desired.
~Original by Mathdreams, edited by pinkpig, /wording fixes by samrocksnature
Solution 2 (More Algebraic)
We only care about the last
digits, so we evaluate
. Note the expression is simply
, so factoring a
we have
. Now, we can divide by
to get
Evaluate the last
digits to get
~Geometry285
See also
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