Fermat and Mersenne numbers in $k$-Pell sequence

For an integer $k\geq 2$, let $(P_n^{(k)})_{n\geq 2-k}$ be the $k$-generalized Pell sequence, which starts with $0,\ldots,0,1$ ($k$ terms) and each term afterwards is defined by the recurrence$P_n^{(k)}=2P_{n-1}^{(k)}+P_{n-2}^{(k)}+\cdots +P_{n-k}^{(k)},\quad \text{for all }n \geq 2.$For any positive integer $n$, a number of the form $2^n+1$ is referred to as a Fermat number, while a number of the form $2^n-1$ is referred to as a Mersenne number. The goal of this paper is to determine Fermat and Mersenne numbers which are members of the $k$-generalized Pell sequence. More precisely, we solve the Diophantine equation $P^{(k)}_n=2^a\pm 1$ in positive integers $n, k, a$ with $k \geq 2$, $a\geq 1$. We prove a theorem which asserts that, if the Diophantine equation $P^{(k)}_n=2^a\pm 1$ has a solution $(n,a,k)$ in positive integers $n, k, a$ with $k \geq 2$, $a\geq 1$, then we must have that $(n,a,k)\in \{(1,1,k),(3,2,k),(5,5,3)\}$. As a result of our theorem, we deduce that the number $1$ is the only Mersenne number and the number $5$ is the only Fermat number in the $k$-Pell sequence.

On a Generalization of a Lucas’ Result and an Application to the 4-Pascal’s Triangle

The Pascal’s triangle is generalized to “the k-Pascal’s triangle” with any integer k ≥ 2 . Let p be any prime number. In this article, we prove that for any positive integers n and e, the n-th row in the p e -Pascal’s triangle consists of integers which are congruent to 1 modulo p if and only if n is of the form p e m − 1 p e − 1 with some integer m ≥ 1 . This is a generalization of a Lucas’ result asserting that the n-th row in the (2-)Pascal’s triangle consists of odd integers if and only if n is a Mersenne number. As an application, we then see that there exists no row in the 4-Pascal’s triangle consisting of integers which are congruent to 1 modulo 4 except the first row. In this application, we use the congruence ( x + 1 ) p e ≡ ( x p + 1 ) p e − 1 ( mod p e ) of binomial expansions which we could prove for any prime number p and any positive integer e. We think that this article is fit for the Special Issue “Number Theory and Symmetry,” since we prove a symmetric property on the 4-Pascal’s triangle by means of a number-theoretical property of binomial expansions.