Asian Research Journal of Mathematics

Perfect numbers, which are integers equal to the sum of their proper divisors, excluding themselves, have intrigued mathematicians for centuries. While it is established that even perfect numbers can be expressed as 2^p-1(2^p-1), where p and 2p-1 are prime numbers (Mersenne primes), the existence of odd perfect numbers remains an unsolved problem. This study aims to prove the nonexistence of odd perfect numbers by utilizing an algorithm which demonstrates that a positive even integer can be partitioned into all pairs of odd numbers. Using this approach, it is proven that any positive odd number 2n+1 can be partitioned into all pairs of both odd and even numbers and from the set of these partitions, we show that there exist a proper subset containing all proper divisors of 2n+1. Using these results, and the facts that there exist infinitely many odd numbers and the odd sums of odd numbers is always odd, we prove the nonexistence of odd perfect numbers contributing to the conjecture that they do not exist.