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Combinatorics Difficulty 6.0 National Olympiad Prove it Taiwan

Let NN denote the set of all positive integers. Find the largest positive integer kk satisfying the following condition:
NN can be partitioned into kk subsets A1,A2,,AkA_1, A_2, \dots, A_k such that for all integers n15n \ge 15 and all i{1,2,,k}i \in \{1, 2, \dots, k\}, one can find two distinct elements a,ba, b in AiA_i with a+b=na+b=n.

Solution

The answer is k=3k=3. For example, take
A1={1,2,3}{3mm4},A2={4,5,6}{3m1m4},A3={7,8,9}{3m2m4}. A_1 = \{1, 2, 3\} \cup \{3m\mid m \ge 4\}, \quad A_2 = \{4, 5, 6\} \cup \{3m-1\mid m \ge 4\}, \quad A_3 = \{7, 8, 9\} \cup \{3m-2\mid m \ge 4\}.
To verify that the above partition satisfies the requirement of the problem, first observe: the situation of the sum of two distinct elements a,ba, b in AiA_i:
(i) a+b=n1+12=13a+b=n \ge 1+12=13, when i=1i=1,
(ii) a+b=n4+11=15a+b=n \ge 4+11=15, when i=2i=2,
(iii) a+b=n7+10=17a+b=n \ge 7+10=17, when i=3i=3.
Therefore, we must find two distinct elements in A3A_3 whose sum is 15(=7+8),16(=7+9)15(=7+8), 16(=7+9).
Now suppose that for some k4k \ge 4, there exist A1,A2,,AkA_1, A_2, \dots, A_k satisfying the requirement of the problem. Clearly, A1,A2,A3,A4AkA_1, A_2, A_3, A_4 \cup \dots \cup A_k also satisfies the requirement of the problem, so we may assume k=4k=4.
Take Bi=Ai{1,2,,23},i=1,2,3,4B_i = A_i \cap \{1, 2, \dots, 23\}, i = 1, 2, 3, 4. For any index ii and the 10 numbers 15, 16, ..., 24, each can be represented as a sum of two distinct elements of BiB_i. Therefore, BiB_i has at least 5 elements. Since B1+B2+B3+B4=23|B_1| + |B_2| + |B_3| + |B_4| = 23, we have Bj=5|B_j| = 5 for some jj. Let Bj={x1,x2,x3,x4,x5}B_j = \{x_1, x_2, x_3, x_4, x_5\}. The sums of two distinct elements in AjA_j can be 15, 16, ..., 24 and these should be sums of any two elements in BjB_j, that is, 4(x1+x2+x3+x4+x5)=15+16++24=1954(x_1 + x_2 + x_3 + x_4 + x_5) = 15 + 16 + \dots + 24 = 195 and 4 divides 195. This is a contradiction!

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Source: MathNet, licensed CC-BY-4.0. Statement translated into English from zh; metadata (topic, difficulty) added by this project.