Factorial prime

A factorial prime is a prime number that is one less or one more than a factorial (all factorials > 1 are even). The first few factorial primes are:

2 (0! + 1 or 1! + 1), 3 (2! + 1), 5 (3!  1), 7 (3! + 1), 23 (4!  1), 719 (6!  1), 5039 (7!  1), 39916801 (11! + 1), 479001599 (12!  1), 87178291199 (14!  1), ... (sequence A088054 in the OEIS)

n! 1 is prime for (sequence A002982 in the OEIS):

n = 3, 4, 6, 7, 12, 14, 30, 32, 33, 38, 94, 166, 324, 379, 469, 546, 974, 1963, 3507, 3610, 6917, 21480, 34790, 94550, 103040, 147855, ...

n! + 1 is prime for (sequence A002981 in the OEIS):

n = 0, 1, 2, 3, 11, 27, 37, 41, 73, 77, 116, 154, 320, 340, 399, 427, 872, 1477, 6380, 26951, 110059, 150209, ...

No other factorial primes are known as of August 2015.

Absence of primes to both sides of a factorial n! implies a run of at least 2n+1 consecutive composite numbers, since n! ± k is divisible by k for 2  k  n. However, the necessary length of this run is asymptotically smaller than the average composite run for integers of similar size (see prime gap).

See also

External links

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