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Combinatorics Difficulty 6.5 National olympiad Prove it Japan

How many possible ways of writing down a sequence of positive integers are there satisfying the following conditions?
Conditions: You start out with writing down the number 20122012 and end up with writing down the number 11, and after writing down a number nn you follow with writing an integer less than or equal to n\sqrt{n}.

Solution

Let mm be a positive integer and denote by ama_m the number of possible ways of writing down a sequence of positive integers satisfying the following, which we call the conditions CmC_m:
CmC_m: Start with writing down the number mm, and end up with writing down the number 11, and after writing down a number nn, follow with writing a positive integer less than or equal to n\sqrt{n}.
Then, we have
a1=1,am=a1+a2++ak, a_1 = 1, \quad a_m = a_1 + a_2 + \cdots + a_k,
where kk is a positive integer satisfying k2+1m(k+1)2k^2 + 1 \le m \le (k+1)^2.

a1=1, a_1 = 1,
a2=a3=a4=a1=1, a_2 = a_3 = a_4 = a_1 = 1,
a5=a6==a9=a1+a2=2, a_5 = a_6 = \cdots = a_9 = a_1 + a_2 = 2,
a10=a11==a16=a1+a2+a3=3, a_{10} = a_{11} = \cdots = a_{16} = a_1 + a_2 + a_3 = 3,
a17=a18==a25=a1+a2+a3+a4=4, a_{17} = a_{18} = \cdots = a_{25} = a_1 + a_2 + a_3 + a_4 = 4,
a26=a27==a36=a1+a2+a3+a4+a5=6 a_{26} = a_{27} = \cdots = a_{36} = a_1 + a_2 + a_3 + a_4 + a_5 = 6
a37=a38==a44=a1+a2+a3+a4+a5+a6=8. a_{37} = a_{38} = \cdots = a_{44} = a_1 + a_2 + a_3 + a_4 + a_5 + a_6 = 8.
From these we finally obtain
a2012=a1+a2++a44=(a1++a4)+(a5++a9)+(a10++a16)+(a17++a25)+(a26++a36)+(a37++a44)=4×1+5×2+7×3+9×4+11×6+8×8=4+10+21+36+66+64=201. \begin{align*} a_{2012} &= a_1 + a_2 + \cdots + a_{44} \\ &= (a_1 + \cdots + a_4) + (a_5 + \cdots + a_9) + (a_{10} + \cdots + a_{16}) \\ &\quad + (a_{17} + \cdots + a_{25}) + (a_{26} + \cdots + a_{36}) + (a_{37} + \cdots + a_{44}) \\ &= 4 \times 1 + 5 \times 2 + 7 \times 3 + 9 \times 4 + 11 \times 6 + 8 \times 8 \\ &= 4 + 10 + 21 + 36 + 66 + 64 = 201. \end{align*}

So, 201201 is the desired answer.

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