Olympiad Maths Prep

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Geometry Difficulty 5.5 AIME, harder Prove it Ukraine

a) Rectangle ABCDABCD is partitioned into squares, each of which has integer perimeter. Is it true that ABCDABCD has integer perimeter?

b) Square ABCDABCD is partitioned into squares, each of which has integer perimeter. Is it true that ABCDABCD has integer perimeter?

Solution

a)
We construct a counterexample. Consider two squares ABMNABMN and NMCDNMCD with side length 14\frac{1}{4}. Then, perimeter of the rectangle ABCDABCD is 2(12+14)=322 \cdot (\frac{1}{2} + \frac{1}{4}) = \frac{3}{2} — non-integer, while both squares have integer perimeter.

b)
Consider the side of the external square, and all squares that have one side which belongs to the side of the external square (see figure 1).

Figure 1

Let aa be the side of the external square, and the sides of small squares are a1,a2,...,ana_1, a_2, ..., a_n. Then a=a1+a2+...+ana = a_1 + a_2 + ... + a_n, and each side aia_i, after multiplying by 44, is integer. Therefore, perimeter PP of our square ABCDABCD is P=4a=4a1+4a2+...+4anP = 4a = 4a_1 + 4a_2 + ... + 4a_n — integer.

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