Maths Olympiad Prep

Library / HMMT February /823 of 1302

HMMT February, 2022

Combinatorics Difficulty 5.4 AIME, harder Find the answer United States

Problem:
Let SS be a set of size 1111. A random 1212-tuple (s1,s2,…,s12)(s_{1}, s_{2}, \ldots, s_{12}) of elements of SS is chosen uniformly at random. Moreover, let π:S→S\pi: S \rightarrow S be a permutation of SS chosen uniformly at random. The probability that si+1≠π(si)s_{i+1} \neq \pi(s_{i}) for all 1≤i≤121 \leq i \leq 12 (where s13=s1s_{13}=s_{1}) can be written as ab\frac{a}{b} where aa and bb are relatively prime positive integers. Compute aa.

A number or a short expression. Fractions can be typed as 3/2, and spacing doesn't matter.

Solution

Solution:
Given a permutation π\pi, let ν(π)\nu(\pi) be the number of fixed points of π\pi. We claim that if we fix π\pi, then the probability that the condition holds, over the randomness of sis_{i}, is 1012+ν(π12)−11112\frac{10^{12}+\nu\left(\pi^{12}\right)-1}{11^{12}}. Note that a point in SS is a fixed point of π12\pi^{12} if and only if the length of its cycle in π\pi is 1,2,3,41,2,3,4, or 66, which happens with probability 511\frac{5}{11}, as each cycle length from 11 to 1111 is equally likely. Therefore, the answer is
Eπ[1012+ν(π12)−11112]=1012+41112 \mathbb{E}_{\pi}\left[\frac{10^{12}+\nu\left(\pi^{12}\right)-1}{11^{12}}\right]=\frac{10^{12}+4}{11^{12}}
Since 1111 does not divide 1012+410^{12}+4 this fraction is simplified.

We now prove the claim. Instead of counting (s1,s2,…,s12)(s_{1}, s_{2}, \ldots, s_{12}), we count tuples (t1,t2,…,t12)(t_{1}, t_{2}, \ldots, t_{12}) so that ti≠ti+1t_{i} \neq t_{i+1} for 1≤i≤111 \leq i \leq 11 and t1≠π12(t12)t_{1} \neq \pi^{12}\left(t_{12}\right). A bijection between the two is to let ti=π−i(si)t_{i}=\pi^{-i}\left(s_{i}\right). To do this, fix a t1t_{1}. If t1t_{1} is a fixed point of π12\pi^{12}, we need to count the possibilities for t2,…,t12t_{2}, \ldots, t_{12} so that t1≠t2,t2≠t3,…,t12≠t1t_{1} \neq t_{2}, t_{2} \neq t_{3}, \ldots, t_{12} \neq t_{1}. This can be done via recursion: if aka_{k} is the number of t2,…,tk+1t_{2}, \ldots, t_{k+1} so that t1≠t2,t2≠t3,…,tk+1≠t1t_{1} \neq t_{2}, t_{2} \neq t_{3}, \ldots, t_{k+1} \neq t_{1}, then a0=0a_{0}=0, while for n≥0n \geq 0 we have an+1=9an+10(10n−an)=10n+1−ana_{n+1}=9 a_{n}+10\left(10^{n}-a_{n}\right)=10^{n+1}-a_{n}; thus a11=1011−1010+⋯+101=111(1012+10)a_{11}=10^{11}-10^{10}+\cdots+10^{1}=\frac{1}{11}\left(10^{12}+10\right). Similarly, if t1t_{1} is not a fixed point of π12\pi^{12}, there are 111(1012−1)\frac{1}{11}\left(10^{12}-1\right) ways. Therefore, number of possible (t1,…,tn)(t_{1}, \ldots, t_{n}) is
101211(ν(π12)+(11−ν(π12)))+111(10ν(π12)−(11−ν(π12)))=1012+ν(π12)−1 \frac{10^{12}}{11}\left(\nu\left(\pi^{12}\right)+\left(11-\nu\left(\pi^{12}\right)\right)\right)+\frac{1}{11}\left(10 \nu\left(\pi^{12}\right)-\left(11-\nu\left(\pi^{12}\right)\right)\right)=10^{12}+\nu\left(\pi^{12}\right)-1
as desired.

Want a route through all this instead of an archive? The track puts 2,604 problems in a working order, from Junior Challenge level to the IMO shortlist.

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