Prime power Prime power In mathematics, a prime power is a positive integer power of a single prime number. For example: , and are prime powers, while , and are not. The number 1 is not counted as a prime power. The prime powers are: 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 11, 13, 16, 17, 19, 23, 25, 27, 29, 31, 32, 37, 41, 43, 47, 49, 53, 59, 61, 64, 67, 71, 73, 79, 81, 83, 89, 97, 101, 103, 107, 109, 113, 121, 125, 127, 128, 131, 137, 139, 149, 151, 157, 163, 167, 169, 173, 179, 181, 191,
Prime number a quadratic polynomial that (for integer arguments) is prime infinitely often. Euler's proof that there are infinitely many primes considers the sums of reciprocals of primes, Euler showed that, for any arbitrary real number formula_22, there exists a prime formula_20 for which this sum is bigger than formula_22. This shows that there are infinitely many primes, because if there were finitely many primes the sum would reach its maximum value at the biggest prime rather than growing past every formula_22. The growth rate of this sum is described more precisely by Mertens' second theorem. For comparison, the sum does not