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Number theory Difficulty 5.5 AIME, harder Prove it Romania

Find all the quadruples (a,b,c,d)(a, b, c, d) of integers, so that a+b+c=2da + b + c = 2d and ab+bc+ca=d2\sqrt{ab} + \sqrt{bc} + \sqrt{ca} = d^2.

Solution

If abc0a \ge b \ge c \ge 0, then d0d \ge 0. From d2=ab+ac+bca+b+c2a+2b+2c4dd^2 = \sqrt{ab} + \sqrt{ac} + \sqrt{bc} \le a + b + c \le 2a + 2b + 2c \le 4d, at least one of the equalities being strict, follows d{0,1,2,3}d \in \{0, 1, 2, 3\}.

Case I: d=0d = 0. Then a=b=c=0a = b = c = 0.

Case II: d=1d = 1. Then a+b+c=2a + b + c = 2 and ab+bc+ca=1\sqrt{ab} + \sqrt{bc} + \sqrt{ca} = 1, hence a=b=1a = b = 1, c=0c = 0.

Case III: d{2,3}d \in \{2, 3\}. When d=2d = 2 we have the possibilities (2,1,1)(2, 1, 1), (2,2,0)(2, 2, 0), (3,1,0)(3, 1, 0), (4,0,0)(4, 0, 0), and for d=3d = 3 we have the possibilities (3,2,1)(3, 2, 1), (3,3,0)(3, 3, 0), (4,2,0)(4, 2, 0), (4,1,1)(4, 1, 1), (5,1,0)(5, 1, 0), (6,0,0)(6, 0, 0); none of them is convenient.

If at least one of the numbers is negative, then all are non-positive, and a,b,c,d-a, -b, -c, -d verify the statement.

Finally, we get the solutions (0,0,0)(0, 0, 0), (0,1,1)(0, 1, 1), (1,0,1)(1, 0, 1), (1,1,0)(1, 1, 0), (0,1,1)(0, -1, -1), (1,0,1)(-1, 0, -1), (1,1,0)(-1, -1, 0).

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