Maths Olympiad Prep

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Combinatorics Difficulty 5.8 AIME, harder Prove it Bulgaria

Problem:

Does there exist a strictly increasing sequence of positive integers {an}n=1\{a_{n}\}_{n=1}^{\infty} such that ann3a_{n} \leq n^{3} for every nn and every positive integer can be written in a unique way as a difference of two terms of the sequence?

Solution

Solution:

Answer: there is such a sequence. We shall define the required sequence inductively. We set a1=1a_{1}=1, a2=2a_{2}=2 and assume that a1,a2,,a2ka_{1}, a_{2}, \ldots, a_{2k} are already determined. Denote by mm the smallest positive integer which cannot be represented as ajaia_{j}-a_{i}, 1i<j2k1 \leq i < j \leq 2k. Since the number of such differences is d=k(2k1)d = k(2k-1), we have md+1m \leq d+1.

Set a2k+2=a2k+1+ma_{2k+2} = a_{2k+1} + m, where a2k+1a_{2k+1} is such that
a2k+1al,a2k+1±mala2k+1alajai,a2k+1+malajai \begin{aligned} & a_{2k+1} \neq a_{l},\quad a_{2k+1} \pm m \neq a_{l} \\ & a_{2k+1} - a_{l} \neq a_{j} - a_{i},\quad a_{2k+1} + m - a_{l} \neq a_{j} - a_{i} \end{aligned}
for 1l2k1 \leq l \leq 2k, 1i<j2k1 \leq i < j \leq 2k. This implies that a1,a2,,a2k+2a_{1}, a_{2}, \ldots, a_{2k+2} are all distinct and every integer between 11 and mm can be written in a unique way as ajaia_{j}-a_{i}, 1i<j2k+21 \leq i < j \leq 2k+2.

Since there are exactly 6k+4kd6k + 4kd "forbidden" values for a2k+1a_{2k+1}, we can choose a2k+1a_{2k+1} with the above properties and such that a2k+16k+4kd+1a_{2k+1} \leq 6k + 4kd + 1. Then
a2k+1<a2k+2=a2k+1+m6k+4kd+1+d+1<(2k+1)3 a_{2k+1} < a_{2k+2} = a_{2k+1} + m \leq 6k + 4kd + 1 + d + 1 < (2k+1)^{3}
and it remains to put the numbers a1,a2,,a2k+2a_{1}, a_{2}, \ldots, a_{2k+2} in increasing order (check that the inequality ann3a_{n} \leq n^{3} is still valid).

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