Suppose is a positive integer, and is a convex -gon inscribed in a circle. It is known that there exists a point inside this -gon such that
Prove that the following equation holds
where .
, 2023
Solutions — 3
Solution 1
All subscripts are to be understood modulo . Denote . For , extend to intersect the circumference at point . Note that
Hence, is an isosceles trapezoid. (In fact, is the polygon obtained by rotating in the clockwise direction by on the circumference.) In particular, . Also, by , we get
Taking the product of the first and last equalities in (*) over all odd , we get
Taking the product of the second and last equalities in (*) over all even , we get
Noting that the right-hand sides of the two equations above are equal, we have
This completes the proof of the problem.
Solution 2
Draw line intersecting line at point . Given that points are concyclic, we have
Therefore, points are concyclic. In particular, , we have . From this and the fact that are concyclic, we get
Together with , we find that . From this we obtain
Moreover, from , we have . We get
Dividing the first equation by the second one yields
By doing the same procedure with adding 2 to each index and multiplying the resulting equations, we obtain
Here all indices are understood modulo . Rearranging the above equation gives
This completes the proof of the problem.
Solution 3
Let the circle in the problem be the unit circle in the complex plane, and let correspond to complex numbers . Without loss of generality (we can always rotate if necessary), let correspond to a non-negative real number , and let .
From the given conditions, we know that , thus
Considering that are unit complex numbers, and , we can solve to get , and similarly , (, indices are understood modulo ). If , then , and in this case forms a regular -gon, and the conclusion is trivially true. Below we assume .
Now consider the Möbius transformation , which has two fixed points (roots of the quadratic equation ), denoted by and . It can be easily verified that .
Let , from , we have that the ratios of consecutive terms among are constants. Thus,
hence
Therefore,
is a complex number of modulus 1 (in fact it can be shown that its value is ), hence
the proposition holds.