Find number of common divisors of 463050 and 2425500
Strategy: Every common divisor is a divisor of the greatest common divisor, so we must find the greatest common divisor, then determine how many factors it has.
- Use the Euclidean Algorithm to find the greatest common divisor.
- Factor the greatest common divisor into primes.
- If the greatest common divisor has prime factorization $$p_1^{\alpha_1}p_2^{\alpha_2} \ldots p_n^{\alpha_n}$$ then a common divisor has factorization $$p_1^{\beta_1}p_2^{\beta_2} \ldots p_n^{\beta_n}$$ where $0 \leq \beta_k \leq \alpha_k$ for $1 \leq k \leq n$, so the number of divisors of the greatest common divisor is $$(\alpha_1 + 1)(\alpha_2 + 1) \ldots (\alpha_n + 1)$$
Among all the common divisors of the two numbers there is a greatest one, and this can be calculated easily: $$\gcd(463050, 2425500)=22050$$ The prime factorisation of this number is $$22050=2^13^25^27^2$$ so the number of common divisors is $$\tau(22050)=(1+1)(2+1)(2+1)(2+1)=54$$ where $\tau(n)$ is the number-of-divisors function.