Edexcel F2 2021 October — Question 9

Exam BoardEdexcel
ModuleF2 (Further Pure Mathematics 2)
Year2021
SessionOctober
TopicSequences and series, recurrence and convergence

  1. (a) Show that
$$n ^ { 5 } - ( n - 1 ) ^ { 5 } \equiv 5 n ^ { 4 } - 10 n ^ { 3 } + 10 n ^ { 2 } - 5 n + 1$$ (b) Hence, using the method of differences, show that for all integer values of \(n\), $$\sum _ { r = 1 } ^ { n } r ^ { 4 } = \frac { 1 } { 30 } n ( n + 1 ) ( 2 n + 1 ) \left( a n ^ { 2 } + b n + c \right)$$ where \(a\), \(b\) and \(c\) are integers to be determined.