CSE115/ENGR160 Discrete Mathematics

03/15/12

Ming-Hsuan Yang
UC Merced

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4.3 Theorem
• Theorem: There are infinitely many primes
• Proof by contradiction
• Assume that there are only finitely many
primes, p1, p2, …, pn. Let Q=p1p2…pn+1
• By Fundamental Theorem of Arithmetic: Q is
prime or else it can be written as the product
of two or more primes

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Theorem
• However, none of the primes pj divides Q, for
if pj | Q, then pj divides Q-p1 p2 … pn =1
• Hence, there is a prime not in the list p 1, p2, …,
pn
• This prime is either Q, if it is prime, or a prime
factor for Q
• This is a contradiction as we assumed that we
have listed all the primes
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Mersenne primes
• As there are infinite number of primes, there is
an ongoing quest to find larger and larger prime
numbers
• The largest prime known has been an integer of
special form 2p-1 where p is also prime
• Furthermore, currently it is not possible to test
numbers not of this or certain other special
forms anywhere near as quickly as determine
whether they are prime
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Mersenne primes
• 22-1=3, 23-1=7, 25-1=31 are Mersenne primes while 211-
1=2047 is not a Mersenne prime (2047=23 ∙ 89)
• Mersenne claims that 2p-1 is prime for p=2, 3, 5, 7, 13,
17, 19, 31, 67, 127, 257 but is composite for all other
primes less than 257
– It took over 300 years to determine it is wrong 5 times
– For p=67, p=257, 2p-1 is not prime
– But p=61, p=87, and p=107, 2p-1 is prime
• The largest Mersenne prime known (as of early 2011)
is 243,112,609-1, a number with over 13 million digits
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Distribution of primes
• The prime number theorem: The ratio of the number
of primes not exceeding x and x/ln x approaches 1 as x
grows without bound
• Can use this theorem to estimate the odds that a
randomly chosen number is prime
• The odds that a randomly selected positive integer less
than n is prime are approximately
(n/ ln n)/n=1/ln n
• The odds that an integer near 101000 is prime are
approximately 1/ln 101000, approximately 1/2300
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Open problems about primes
• Goldbach’s conjecture: every even integer n,
n>2, is the sum of two primes
4=2+2, 6=3+3, 8=5+3, 10=7+3, 12=7+5, …
• As of 2011, the conjecture has been checked
for all positive even integers up to 1.6 ⋅1018
• Twin prime conjecture: Twin primes are
primes that differ by 2. There are infinitely
many twin primes

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Greatest common divisors
• Let a and b be integers, not both zero. The largest
integer d such that d | a and d | b is called the
greatest common divisor (GCD) of a and b, often
denoted as gcd(a,b)
• The integers a and b are relative prime if their GCD is
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gcd(10, 17)=1, gcd(10, 21)=1, gcd(10,24)=2
• The integers a1, a2, …, an are pairwise relatively
prime if gcd(ai, aj)=1 whenever 1 ≤ i < j ≤ n

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Prime factorization and GCD
• Finding GCD
a  p1a1 p2a2  pnan , b  p1b1 p2b2  pnbn
gcd(a, b)  p1min(a1 ,b1 ) p2min(a2 ,b2 )  pnmin( an ,bn )
120  23  3  5, 500  2 2  53
gcd(120,500)  2 2  30  51  20

• Least common multiples of the positive

integers a and b is the smallest positive
integer that is divisible by both a and b,
denoted as lcm(a,b)
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Least common multiple
• Finding LCM
a  p1a1 p2a2  pnan , b  p1b1 p2b2  pnbn
lcm(a, b)  p1max( a1 ,b1 ) p2max( a2 ,b2 )  pnmax( an ,bn )
120  23  3  5, 500  2 2  53
lcm(120,500)  23  31  53  8  3 125  3000

• Let a and b be positive integers, then

ab=gcd(a,b)∙lcm(a,b)

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Euclidean algorithm
• Need more efficient prime factorization algorithm
• Example: Find gcd(91,287)
• 287=91 ∙ 3 +14
• Any divisor of 287 and 91 must be a divisor of 287- 91 ∙ 3 =14
• Any divisor of 91 and 14 must also be a divisor of 287= 91 ∙ 3
• Hence, the gcd(91,287)=gcd(91,14)
• Next, 91= 14 ∙ 6+7
• Any divisor of 91 and 14 also divides 91- 14 ∙ 6=7 and any divisor
of 14 and 7 divides 91, i.e., gcd(91,14)=gcd(14,7)
• 14= 7 ∙ 2, gcd(14,7)=7, and thus
gcd(287,91)=gcd(91,14)=gcd(14,7)=7

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Euclidean algorithm
• Lemma: Let a=bq+r, where a, b, q, and r are integers. Then
gcd(a,b)=gcd(b,r)
• Proof: Suppose d divides both a and b. Recall if d|a and d|b,
then d|a-bk for some integer k. It follows that d also divides
a-bq=r. Hence, any common division of a and b is also a
common division of b and r
• Suppose that d divides both b and r, then d also divides
bq+r=a. Hence, any common divisor of b and r is also common
divisor of a and b
• Consequently, gcd(a, b)=gcd(b,r)

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Euclidean algorithm
• Suppose a and b are positive integers, a≥b. Let r0=a and
r1=b, we successively apply the division algorithm
r0  r1q1  r2 ,0  r2  r1
r1  r2 q2  r3 ,0  r3  r2
...
rn  2  rn 1qn 1  rn ,0  rn  rn 1
rn 1  rn qn
gcd(a, b)  gcd(r0 , r1 )  gcd(r1 , r2 )    gcd(rn  2 , rn 1 )
• Hence, the gcd is the
gcd(last
rn 1 ,r nnonzero
)  gcd(rn ,0)remainder
 rn in the
sequence of divisions

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Example
• Find the GCD of 414 and 662
662=414 ∙ 1+248
414=248 ∙ 1+166
248=166 ∙ 1+82 a=bq+r
gcd(a,b)=gcd(b,r)
166=82 ∙ 2 + 2
82=2 ∙ 41
gcd(414,662)=2 (the last nonzero remainder)

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The Euclidean algorithm
• procedure gcd(a, b: positive integers)
x := a
y:=b
while (y≠0)
begin
r:=x mod y
x:=y
y:=r
end {gcd(a,b)=x}
• The time complexity is O(log b) (where a ≥ b)
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4.5 Applications of congruence
• Hashing function: h(k) where k is a key
• One common function: h(k)=k mod m where m is the
number of available memory location
• For example, m=111,
– h(064212848)=064212848 mod 111=14
– h(037149212)=037149212 mod 111=65
• Not one-to-one mapping, and thus needs to deal with
collision
– h(107405723)=107405723 mod 111 = 14
– Assign to the next available memory location

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Pseudorandom numbers
• Generate random numbers
• The most commonly used procedure is the
linear congruential method
– Modulus m, multiple a, increment c, and seed x0,
with 2≤a<m, 0 ≤c<m, and 0≤x0<m
– Generate a sequence of pseudorandom numbers
{xn} with 0 ≤ xn < m for all n, by
xn+1=(axn+c) mod m

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Example
• Let m=9, a=7, c=4, x0=3
– x1=7x0+4 mod 9=(21+4) mod 9=25 mod 9 = 7
– x2=7x1+4 mod 9=(49+4) mod 9=53 mod 9 = 8
– x3=7x2+4 mod 9=(56+4) mod 9=60 mod 9 = 6 xn+1=(axn+c) mod m

– x4=7x3+4 mod 9=(42+4) mod 9=46 mod 9 = 1

– x5=7x4+4 mod 9=(7+4) mod 9=11 mod 9 = 2
– x6=7x5+4 mod 9=(14+4) mod 9=18 mod 9 = 0
– x7=7x6+4 mod 9=(0+4) mod 9=4 mod 9 = 4
– x8=7x7+4 mod 9=(28+4) mod 9=32 mod 9 =5
– x9=7x8+4 mod 9=(35+4) mod 9=11 mod 9 = 3
• A sequence of 3, 7, 8, 6, 1, 2, 0, 4, 5, 3, 7, 8, 6, 1, 2, 0, 4, 5, 3 , …
• Contains 9 different numbers before repeating

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4.6 Cryptology
• One of the earliest known use is by Julius
Caesar, shift each letter by 3
f(p)=(p+3) mod 26
– Translate “meet you in the park”
– 12 4 4 19 24 14 20 8 13 19 7 4 15 0 17 10
– 15 7 7 22 1 17 23 11 16 22 10 7 18 3 20 13
– “phhw brx lq wkh sdun”
– To decrypt, f-1(p)=(p-3) mod 26

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Example
• Other options: shift each letter by k
– f(p)=(p+k) mod 26, with f-1(p)=(p-k) mod 26
– f(p)=(ap+k) mod 26

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RSA cryptosystem
• Each individual has an encryption key consisting of a modulus
n=pq, where p and q are large primes, say with 200 digits
each, and an exponent e that is relatively prime to (p-1)(q-1)
(i.e., gcd(e, (p-1)(q-1))=1)
• To transform M: Encryption: C=Me mod n, Decryption: Cd=M
(mod pq)
• The product of these primes n=pq, with approximately 400
digits, cannot be factored in a reasonable length of time (the
most efficient factorization methods known as of 2005
require billions of years to factor 400-digit integers)

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