Tuesday, 14 July 2026

Exercise (7.1).13

Prove that the multiplicative inverse of a quadratic residue of $p$ is also a quadratic residue of $p$.


Euler's Criterion gives us

$$ a^{\frac{p-1}{2}} \equiv 1 \pmod p $$

By definition of multiplicative inverse, we have

$$ a \times a^{-1} \equiv 1 \pmod p $$

Raising this to index $\frac{p-1}{2}$

$$ \begin{align} (a)^{\frac{p-1}{2}} \times (a^{-1})^{\frac{p-1}{2}} & \equiv 1^{\frac{p-1}{2}} \pmod p \\ \\   1 \times (a^{-1})^{\frac{p-1}{2}} & \equiv 1 \pmod p \\ \\ (a^{-1})^{\frac{p-1}{2}} & \equiv 1 \pmod p  \end{align}$$

This is Euler's Criterion that tells us $a^{-1}$ is a quadratic residue of $p$.