SAGAR SINGH - IIT DELHI
Last Activity: 13 Years ago
Dear student,
Note that 200! = 200 x 199 x 198 x … x 3 x 2 x 1, by definition.
Finding how many zeros 200! ends with is the same as finding how many consecutive times 200! can be divided by ten without leaving a remainder.
To this end, let us try to compute how many 5′s are in the prime factorization of 200!.
Each of 5, 10, 15, …, 200 has a factor of 5 in it, so that gives 40 fives in the prime factorization of 200!.
In addition, each of 25, 50, 75, …, 200 has a second factor of 5 that we haven’t counted yet, which gives 8 more fives in the prime factorization of 200!.
Finally, 125 has a third factor of 5, which gives one additional factor of 5 in the prime factorization of 200!.
So 200! = 5^49 * (some number not divisible by 5).
It should be evident that 200! has many, many more copies of 2 in its prime factorization than it has copies of 5. (I won’t compute exactly how many copies of 2 it has, because it’s not necessary.)
So we can write 200! = 2^49 * 5^49 * (some number not divisible by 5).
Thus, we can divide 200! by 10 only forty-nine times; after that we get a number that isn’t divisible by 5, hence not by 10 either.
So 200! ends in forty-nine zeros.
Please feel free to ask your queries here. We are all IITians and here to help you in your IIT JEE preparation.
All the best.
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Sagar Singh
B.Tech, IIT Delhi
sagarsingh24.iitd@gmail.com