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From: dxm@lanl.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.math
Subject: perfect numbers: Thanks!
Message-ID: <34213@lanl.ARPA>
Date: Tue, 3-Dec-85 11:12:14 EST
Article-I.D.: lanl.34213
Posted: Tue Dec  3 11:12:14 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 5-Dec-85 07:23:49 EST
Distribution: net
Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Lines: 10

I'd like to thank all the people who answered my posting about the nature
of perfect numbers.  The discussion has been most enlightening for me.
In particular I'd like to thank Victor Allis and Bob Silverman for their
proofs that it is insufficient that n be prime (in the equation
(2^n -1)*2^(n-1) ) for a number to be perfect, but that (2^n -1) must be 
a Mersenne prime.  These were quite helpful.

Thanks folks,
Doug Miller                     dxm@lanl.arpa
                                 ....!ihnp4!lanl!dxm