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Geometry Difficulty 5.6 AIME, harder Prove it Estonia

Let ABCABC be an isosceles triangle with AB=AC|AB| = |AC|. The bisector of angle ABCABC meets the side ACAC at the point DD.
a) Is the triangle ABDABD isosceles whenever the triangle BCDBCD is isosceles?
b) Is the triangle BCDBCD isosceles whenever the triangle ABDABD is isosceles?

Solution

a) Denote BAC=α\angle BAC = \alpha and ABC=ACB=β\angle ABC = \angle ACB = \beta.

Figure 1
Fig. 6

Assume that the triangle BCDBCD is isosceles. If CB=CD|CB| = |CD|, then the angles CBD\angle CBD, CDB\angle CDB and BCD\angle BCD would be β2\frac{\beta}{2}, β2\frac{\beta}{2} and β\beta respectively, which implies 2β2+β=1802 \cdot \frac{\beta}{2} + \beta = 180^\circ giving β=90\beta = 90^\circ. This is impossible, since the triangle ABCABC has two angles equal to β\beta. If DB=DC|DB| = |DC|, then we would get β2=β\frac{\beta}{2} = \beta, which is also impossible. This leaves the only option BC=BD|BC| = |BD|. Then, the triangles ABCABC and BCDBCD are similar, since all corresponding angles are the same. Therefore DBA=DBC=BAC=BAD\angle DBA = \angle DBC = \angle BAC = \angle BAD, showing that the triangle ABDABD is isosceles with DA=DB|DA| = |DB|.

b) If the angles of the triangle ABCABC are 37180\frac{3}{7} \cdot 180^\circ, 27180\frac{2}{7} \cdot 180^\circ, 27180\frac{2}{7} \cdot 180^\circ (Fig. 7), then ADB=180BADABD=1803718017180=37180=BAD\angle ADB = 180^\circ - \angle BAD - \angle ABD = 180^\circ - \frac{3}{7} \cdot 180^\circ - \frac{1}{7} \cdot 180^\circ = \frac{3}{7} \cdot 180^\circ = \angle BAD, which shows that the triangle ABDABD is isosceles with BA=BD|BA| = |BD|. At the same time, the angles in the triangle BCDBCD are 17180\frac{1}{7} \cdot 180^\circ, 27180\frac{2}{7} \cdot 180^\circ, 47180\frac{4}{7} \cdot 180^\circ, which are pairwise different, so the triangle BCDBCD is not isosceles.

Figure 2
Fig. 7

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