Maths Olympiad Prep

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Combinatorics Difficulty 5.8 AIME, harder Prove it Bulgaria

Problem:

The sets M={1,2,,27}M=\{1,2, \ldots, 27\} and A={a1,a2,,ak}{1,2,,14}A=\{a_{1}, a_{2}, \ldots, a_{k}\} \subset \{1,2, \ldots, 14\} have the following property: every element of MM is either an element of AA or the sum of two (possibly identical) elements of AA. Find the minimum value of kk.

Solution

Solution:

The elements of AA give (k2)+k+k=k(k+3)2\binom{k}{2}+k+k=\frac{k(k+3)}{2} sums of the required kind (with two different summands, two equal summands or one summand, respectively). Therefore k(k+3)227\frac{k(k+3)}{2} \geq 27, whence k6k \geq 6.

If k=6k=6 every element of MM has a unique representation. This consecutively implies 1A,2A,3A,4A,5A1 \in A, 2 \notin A, 3 \in A, 4 \notin A, 5 \in A and now 6=3+3=1+56=3+3=1+5 has two representations, a contradiction. Therefore k7k \geq 7.

Assume that A={a1,a2,,a7}A=\{a_{1}, a_{2}, \ldots, a_{7}\} has the required property and a1<a2<<a7a_{1}<a_{2}<\cdots<a_{7}. Since 11 and 2727 have unique representations, we have a1=1,a6=13a_{1}=1, a_{6}=13 and a7=14a_{7}=14. Also, it is easy to see that a2{2,3}a_{2} \in\{2,3\} and a35a_{3} \leq 5. The only two possible representations of 2525 are 25=13+12=14+1125=13+12=14+11 and therefore a5=12a_{5}=12 or a5=11a_{5}=11.

Case 1. a5=12a_{5}=12. It follows from 23=14+9=13+10=12+1123=14+9=13+10=12+11 that a4{9,10,11}a_{4} \in\{9,10,11\}. Then checking all possibilities for 2121 we see that a37a_{3} \geq 7, which contradicts to the above restriction a35a_{3} \leq 5.

Case 2. a5=11a_{5}=11. As in case 1 we conclude that a4{9,10}a_{4} \in\{9,10\}. On the other hand by 21=14+7=13+8=11+1021=14+7=13+8=11+10 we have a4{7,8,10}a_{4} \in\{7,8,10\} and therefore a4=10a_{4}=10. Now using a35a_{3} \leq 5 we see that the only possibility for 1919 is 19=14+519=14+5. This implies that a3=5a_{3}=5 and a2=3a_{2}=3, i.e. A={1,3,5,10,11,13,14}A=\{1,3,5,10,11,13,14\}. But this set does not have the required property.

The set A={1,3,5,7,9,11,13,14}A=\{1,3,5,7,9,11,13,14\} has cardinality 88 and possesses the required property. Therefore the minimum value of kk is 88.

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Source: MathNet, licensed CC-BY-4.0. Statement reproduced verbatim; metadata (topic, difficulty) added by this project.