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2005 AMC 12A Problem 23

Problem 23 of 25HarderAlgebraNumber TheoryCounting & Probability

Two distinct numbers aa and bb are chosen randomly from the set {2,22,23,,225}.\{2, 2^2, 2^3, \ldots, 2^{25}\}. What is the probability that logab\log_a b is an integer?

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Solution

Let a=2ja = 2^j and b=2k.b = 2^k. Then logab=kj,\log_a b = \dfrac{k}{j}, which is an integer exactly when kk is a multiple of j.j. For each j,j, the number of valid kjk \ne j in {1,,25}\{1, \ldots, 25\} is 25j1.\left\lfloor \tfrac{25}{j} \right\rfloor - 1. Summing over jj gives 24+11+7+5+4+3+2+2+41=62 \begin{aligned} &24 + 11 + 7 + 5 + 4 + 3 + 2 \\ &\quad {}+ 2 + 4 \cdot 1 = 62 \end{aligned} ordered pairs (a,b).(a, b). Since there are 2524=60025 \cdot 24 = 600 ordered pairs of distinct elements, the probability is 62600=31300.\dfrac{62}{600} = \dfrac{31}{300}. Thus, the correct answer is B.

More practice

Concepts: divisibility · floor and ceiling functions · basic probability

Problem text and solution from the LIVE past-contest archive. See also the AoPS wiki page for community solutions.