Maths Olympiad Prep

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Geometry Difficulty 5.1 AIME, harder Prove it Romania

Consider a regular prism ABCABCABCA'B'C'. A plane α\alpha containing point AA meets the rays BBBB' and CCCC' at points EE and FF such that
area [ABE]+area [ACF]=area [AEF]. \text{area } [ABE] + \text{area } [ACF] = \text{area } [AEF].

Find the angle determined by the planes AEFAEF and BCCBCC'.

Solution

Let MM be the midpoint of BCBC and let uu be the angle determined by the planes AEFAEF and BCCBCC'. Since triangle MEFMEF is the projection of the triangle AEFAEF onto BCCBCC', we have
cosu=[MEF][AEF]=[BCFE]2[AEF]=[BCFE]2([ABE]+[ACF])==[BCFE]4([MBE]+[MCF])=[BCFE]2[BCFE]=12, \begin{aligned} \cos u &= \frac{[MEF]}{[AEF]} = \frac{[BCFE]}{2[AEF]} = \frac{[BCFE]}{2([ABE] + [ACF])} = \\ &= \frac{[BCFE]}{4([MBE] + [MCF])} = \frac{[BCFE]}{2[BCFE]} = \frac{1}{2}, \end{aligned}
hence u=60u = 60^\circ.

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