Maths Olympiad Prep

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, 2015

Algebra Difficulty 6.3 National Olympiad Prove it United States

Problem:

Alice Czarina is bored and is playing a game with a pile of rocks. The pile initially contains 20152015 rocks. At each round, if the pile has NN rocks, she removes kk of them, where 1kN1 \leq k \leq N, with each possible kk having equal probability. Alice Czarina continues until there are no more rocks in the pile. Let pp be the probability that the number of rocks left in the pile after each round is a multiple of 55. If pp is of the form 5a31bcd5^{a} \cdot 31^{b} \cdot \frac{c}{d}, where a,ba, b are integers and c,dc, d are positive integers relatively prime to 5315 \cdot 31, find a+ba+b.

Solution

Solution:

Answer: 501-501

We claim that
p=15610111516202006201020112015. p = \frac{1}{5} \frac{6}{10} \frac{11}{15} \frac{16}{20} \cdots \frac{2006}{2010} \frac{2011}{2015}.
Let pnp_n be the probability that, starting with nn rocks, the number of rocks left after each round is a multiple of 55. Indeed, using recursions we have
p5k=p5k5+p5k10++p5+p05k p_{5k} = \frac{p_{5k-5} + p_{5k-10} + \cdots + p_5 + p_0}{5k}
for k1k \geq 1. For k2k \geq 2 we replace kk with k1k-1, giving us
p5k5=p5k10+p5k15++p5+p05k5(5k5)p5k5=p5k10+p5k15++p5+p0 \begin{gathered} p_{5k-5} = \frac{p_{5k-10} + p_{5k-15} + \cdots + p_5 + p_0}{5k-5} \\ \Longrightarrow \\ (5k-5) p_{5k-5} = p_{5k-10} + p_{5k-15} + \cdots + p_5 + p_0 \end{gathered}
Substituting this back into the first equation, we have
5kp5k=p5k5+(p5k10+p5k15++p5+p0)=p5k5+(5k5)p5k5 5k p_{5k} = p_{5k-5} + \left(p_{5k-10} + p_{5k-15} + \cdots + p_5 + p_0\right) = p_{5k-5} + (5k-5) p_{5k-5}
which gives p5k=5k45kp5k5p_{5k} = \frac{5k-4}{5k} p_{5k-5}. Using this equation repeatedly along with the fact that p0=1p_0 = 1 proves the claim.

Now, the power of 55 in the denominator is v5(2015!)=403+80+16+3=502v_5(2015!) = 403 + 80 + 16 + 3 = 502, and 55 does not divide any term in the numerator. Hence a=502a = -502. (The sum counts multiples of 55 plus multiples of 525^2 plus multiples of 535^3 and so on; a multiple of 5n5^n but not 5n+15^{n+1} is counted exactly nn times, as desired.)

Noting that 2015=31652015 = 31 \cdot 65, we found that the numbers divisible by 3131 in the numerator are those of the form 31+155k31 + 155k where 0k120 \leq k \leq 12, including 312=96131^2 = 961; in the denominator they are of the form 155k155k where 1k131 \leq k \leq 13. Hence b=(13+1)13=1b = (13 + 1) - 13 = 1 where the extra 11 comes from 31231^2 in the numerator. Thus a+b=501a + b = -501.

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