How many ordered pairs of positive integers $(x,y)$ are there such that $y^2-x^2=2y+7x+4$? $ \textbf{(A)}\ 3 \qquad\textbf{(B)}\ 2 \qquad\textbf{(C)}\ 1 \qquad\textbf{(D)}\ 0 \qquad\textbf{(E)}\ \text{Infinitely many} $

For matrices $A=[a_{ij}]_{m \times m}$ and $B=[b_{ij}]_{m \times m}$ where $A,B \in \mathbb{Z} ^{m \times m}$ let $A \equiv B \pmod{n}$ only if $a_{ij} \equiv b_{ij} \pmod{n}$ for every $i,j \in \{ 1,2,...,m \}$, that's $A-B=nZ$ for some $Z \in \mathbb{Z}^{m \times m}$. (The symbol $A \in \mathbb{Z} ^{m \times m}$ means that every element in $A$ is an integer.) Prove that for $A \in \mathbb{Z} ^{m \times m}$ there is $B \in \mathbb{Z} ^{m \times m}$ , where $AB \equiv I \pmod{n }$ only if $(\det (A),n)=1$ and find the value of $B$ in the form of $A$ where $I$ represents the dimensional identity matrix $m \times m$. [i](PP-nine)[/i]

Let $n\geq 2$ a fixed integer. We shall call a $n\times n$ matrix $A$ with rational elements a [i]radical[/i] matrix if there exist an infinity of positive integers $k$, such that the equation $X^k=A$ has solutions in the set of $n\times n$ matrices with rational elements. a) Prove that if $A$ is a radical matrix then $\det A \in \{-1,0,1\}$ and there exists an infinity of radical matrices with determinant 1; b) Prove that there exist an infinity of matrices that are not radical and have determinant 0, and also an infinity of matrices that are not radical and have determinant 1. [i]After an idea of Harazi[/i]

Does there exist such a configuration of 22 circles and 22 point, that any circle contains at leats 7 points and any point belongs at least to 7 circles?

Prove that if $n$ is large enough, in every $n\times n$ square that a natural number is written on each one of its cells, one can find a subsquare from the main square such that the sum of the numbers is this subsquare is divisible by $1391$.

Start with a finite sequence $ a_1,a_2,\dots,a_n$ of positive integers. If possible, choose two indices $ j < k$ such that $ a_j$ does not divide $ a_k$ and replace $ a_j$ and $ a_k$ by $ \gcd(a_j,a_k)$ and $ \text{lcm}\,(a_j,a_k),$ respectively. Prove that if this process is repeated, it must eventually stop and the final sequence does not depend on the choices made. (Note: $ \gcd$ means greatest common divisor and lcm means least common multiple.)

Let $A$ be a $3\times 3$ real matrix such that the vectors $Au$ and $u$ are orthogonal for every column vector $u\in \mathbb{R}^{3}$. Prove that: a) $A^{T}=-A$. b) there exists a vector $v \in \mathbb{R}^{3}$ such that $Au=v\times u$ for every $u\in \mathbb{R}^{3}$, where $v \times u$ denotes the vector product in $\mathbb{R}^{3}$.

For each positive integer $n$ let $A_n$ be the $n \times n$ matrix such that its $a_{ij}$ entry is equal to ${i+j-2 \choose j-1}$ for all $1\leq i,j \leq n.$ Find the determinant of $A_n$.

Alice and Bob play the following game: Initially, there is a $2016\times2016$ "empty" matrix. Taking turns, with Alice playing first, each player chooses a real number and fill it into an empty entry. If the determinant of the last matrix is non-zero, then Alice wins. Otherwise, Bob wins. Who has the winning strategy?

An $n\times n$ matrix $A$ with integer entries is called [i]representative[/i] if, for any integer vector $\mathbf{v}$, there is a finite sequence $0=\mathbf{v}_0,\mathbf{v}_1,\dots,\mathbf{v}_{\ell}=\mathbf{v}$ of integer vectors such that for each $0\leq i <\ell$, either $\mathbf{v}_{i+1}=A\mathbf{v}_{i}$ or $\mathbf{v}_{i+1}-\mathbf{v}_i$ is an element of the standard basis (i.e. one of its entries is $1$, the rest are all equal to $0$). Show that $A$ is not representative if and only if $A^T$ has a real eigenvector with all non-negative entries and non-negative eigenvalue.

Let $A,B\in M_2(\mathbb Z)$ s.t. $AB=\begin{pmatrix}1&2005\\0&1\end{pmatrix}$. Prove that there is a matrix $C\in M_2(\mathbb Z)$ s.t. $BA=C^{2005}$. [i]Dinu Serbanescu[/i]

Let $p$ be a prime and let $M$ be an $n\times m$ matrix with integer entries such that $Mv\not\equiv 0\pmod{p}$ for any column vector $v\neq 0$ whose entries are $0$ are $1$. Show that there exists a row vector $x$ with integer entries such that no entry of $xM$ is $0\pmod{p}$. (translated by L. Erdős)

The alphabet in its natural order $\text{ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ}$ is $T_0$. We apply a permutation to $T_0$ to get $T_1$ which is $\text{JQOWIPANTZRCVMYEGSHUFDKBLX}$. If we apply the same permutation to $T_1$, we get $T_2$ which is $\text{ZGYKTEJMUXSODVLIAHNFPWRQCB}$. We continually apply this permutation to each $T_m$ to get $T_{m+1}$. Find the smallest positive integer $n$ so that $T_n=T_0$.

Define a [i]T-grid[/i] to be a $ 3\times3$ matrix which satisfies the following two properties: (1) Exactly five of the entries are $ 1$'s, and the remaining four entries are $ 0$'s. (2) Among the eight rows, columns, and long diagonals (the long diagonals are $ \{a_{13},a_{22},a_{31}\}$ and $ \{a_{11},a_{22},a_{33}\}$, no more than one of the eight has all three entries equal. Find the number of distinct T-grids.

For an arbitrary square matrix $M$, define $$\exp(M)=I+\frac M{1!}+\frac{M^2}{2!}+\frac{M^3}{3!}+\ldots.$$Construct $2\times2$ matrices $A$ and $B$ such that $\exp(A+B)\ne\exp(A)\exp(B)$.

Determine all complex numbers $\lambda$ for which there exists a positive integer $n$ and a real $n\times n$ matrix $A$ such that $A^2=A^T$ and $\lambda$ is an eigenvalue of $A$.

Let $A$ be a real $n\times n$ Matrix and define $e^{A}=\sum_{k=0}^{\infty} \frac{A^{k}}{k!}$ Prove or disprove that for any real polynomial $P(x)$ and any real matrices $A,B$, $P(e^{AB})$ is nilpotent if and only if $P(e^{BA})$ is nilpotent.

Let $G$ be the set of $2\times 2$ matrices that such $$ G = \left\{ \begin{pmatrix} a & b \\ c & d \end{pmatrix} \mid\, a,b,c,d \in \mathbb{Z}, ad-bc = 1, c \text{ is a multiple of } 3 \right\} $$ and two matrices in $G$: $$ A = \begin{pmatrix} 1 & 1 \\ 0 & 1 \end{pmatrix}\;\;\; B = \begin{pmatrix} -1 & 1 \\ -3 & 2 \end{pmatrix} $$ Show that any matrix in $G$ can be written as a product $M_1M_2\cdots M_r$ such that $M_i \in \{A, A^{-1}, B, B^{-1}\}, \forall i \leq r$

A cake has the form of an $ n$ x $ n$ square composed of $ n^{2}$ unit squares. Strawberries lie on some of the unit squares so that each row or column contains exactly one strawberry; call this arrangement $\mathcal{A}$. Let $\mathcal{B}$ be another such arrangement. Suppose that every grid rectangle with one vertex at the top left corner of the cake contains no fewer strawberries of arrangement $\mathcal{B}$ than of arrangement $\mathcal{A}$. Prove that arrangement $\mathcal{B}$ can be obtained from $ \mathcal{A}$ by performing a number of switches, defined as follows: A switch consists in selecting a grid rectangle with only two strawberries, situated at its top right corner and bottom left corner, and moving these two strawberries to the other two corners of that rectangle.

Let be a matrix $ A\in\mathcal{M}_2(\mathbb{R}) $ having the property that the numbers $ \det (A+X) ,\det (A^2+X^2) ,\det (A^3+X^3) $ are (in this order) in geometric progression, for any matrix $ X\in\mathcal{M}_2(\mathbb{R}) . $ Prove that $ A=0. $ [i]Marius Ghergu[/i]

Let $n \ge 2$ be an integer. Find all real numbers $a$ such that there exist real numbers $x_1,x_2,\dots,x_n$ satisfying \[x_1(1-x_2)=x_2(1-x_3)=\dots=x_n(1-x_1)=a.\] [i]Proposed by Walther Janous and Gerhard Kirchner, Innsbruck.[/i]

For an $n\times n$ matrix with real entries let $||M||=\sup_{x\in \mathbb{R}^{n}\setminus\{0\}}\frac{||Mx||_{2}}{||x||_{2}}$, where $||\cdot||_{2}$ denotes the Euclidean norm on $\mathbb{R}^{n}$. Assume that an $n\times n$ matrxi $A$ with real entries satisfies $||A^{k}-A^{k-1}||\leq\frac{1}{2002k}$ for all positive integers $k$. Prove that $||A^{k}||\leq 2002$ for all positive integers $k$.

Let $A,B\in\mathcal{M}_3(\mathbb{R})$ de matrices such that $A^2+B^2=O_3.$ Prove that $\det(aA+bB)=0$ for any real numbers $a$ and $b.$

For an ${n\times n}$ matrix $A$, let $X_{i}$ be the set of entries in row $i$, and $Y_{j}$ the set of entries in column $j$, ${1\leq i,j\leq n}$. We say that $A$ is [i]golden[/i] if ${X_{1},\dots ,X_{n},Y_{1},\dots ,Y_{n}}$ are distinct sets. Find the least integer $n$ such that there exists a ${2004\times 2004}$ golden matrix with entries in the set ${\{1,2,\dots ,n\}}$.

Solve the system of equations: $ \begin{matrix} |x+y| + |1-x| = 6 \\ |x+y+1| + |1-y| = 4. \end{matrix} $