Maths Olympiad Prep

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Geometry Difficulty 7.1 National Olympiad, round 2 Prove it Romania

In a regular tetrahedron ABCDABCD consider planes that are parallel to its faces such that each edge is divided into 6 equal segments. These planes determine, on the edges of the tetrahedron, on its faces and in its interior a set consisting of 80 points of intersection. Denote this set by VV.
Find the maximum number of elements of a subset WW of the set V{A,B,C,D}V \cup \{A, B, C, D\}, having the property: any three points of WW are not collinear and the plane generated by them is neither parallel with any of the faces of the tetrahedron ABCDABCD, nor contains one of his faces.
Mihai Monea

Solution

Suppose, WLOG, that the height of ABCDABCD equals 66. Denote by kk the maximal number of elements of the set WW and by M1,,MkM_1, \dots, M_k its elements. For each i{1,2,,k}i \in \{1, 2, \dots, k\} denote by ai,bi,cia_i, b_i, c_i, and did_i the distances from the point MiM_i to the planes (BCD),(ACD),(ABD)(BCD), (ACD), (ABD) and (ABC)(ABC) respectively. Then ai,bi,ci,di{0,1,2,,6}a_i, b_i, c_i, d_i \in \{0, 1, 2, \dots, 6\}. Because the sum of the distances from an interior point to the faces of a regular tetrahedron equals its height, we get that ai+bi+ci+di=6a_i + b_i + c_i + d_i = 6. Consequently, if T=(a1+a2++ak)+(b1+b2++bk)+(c1+c2++ck)+(d1+d2++dk)T = (a_1 + a_2 + \dots + a_k) + (b_1 + b_2 + \dots + b_k) + (c_1 + c_2 + \dots + c_k) + (d_1 + d_2 + \dots + d_k), we get T=5T = 5.
Let s=[k/2]s = [k/2]. As no more than two of the numbers a1,a2,,aka_1, a_2, \dots, a_k can be equal, we deduce s7s \le 7.

For even kk, k=2sk = 2s, we have a1+a2++ak20+21++2(s1)=s2sa_1 + a_2 + \dots + a_k \ge 2 \cdot 0 + 2 \cdot 1 + \dots + 2 \cdot (s-1) = s^2 - s. So T=12s4s24sT = 12s \ge 4s^2 - 4s, and thus s4s \le 4 and k8k \le 8. For odd kk, k=2s+1k = 2s + 1, we have a1+a2++ak20+21++2(s1)+s=s2a_1 + a_2 + \dots + a_k \ge 2 \cdot 0 + 2 \cdot 1 + \dots + 2 \cdot (s-1) + s = s^2. Thus T=12s+64s2T = 12s + 6 \ge 4s^2, implying s3s \le 3 and k7k \le 7.

To give an example of an 8-element set, use the notation (ai,bi,ci,di)(a_i, b_i, c_i, d_i) as in the above considerations and consider as WW the set (0,1,2,3),(1,0,2,3),(0,1,3,2),(1,0,3,2),(2,3,0,1),(2,3,1,0),(3,2,1,0)(0, 1, 2, 3), (1, 0, 2, 3), (0, 1, 3, 2), (1, 0, 3, 2), (2, 3, 0, 1), (2, 3, 1, 0), (3, 2, 1, 0) and (3,2,0,1)(3, 2, 0, 1).

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