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Algebra Difficulty 5.7 AIME, harder Prove it Romania

Prove that, if positive real numbers a1,a2,,ana_1, a_2, \dots, a_n have the product 11, then
(a1a2)n1+(a2a3)n1++(an1an)n1+(ana1)n1a12+a22++an2. \left(\frac{a_1}{a_2}\right)^{n-1} + \left(\frac{a_2}{a_3}\right)^{n-1} + \dots + \left(\frac{a_{n-1}}{a_n}\right)^{n-1} + \left(\frac{a_n}{a_1}\right)^{n-1} \geq a_1^2 + a_2^2 + \dots + a_n^2.

Solution

We prove that, for all a1,a2,,an>0a_1, a_2, \dots, a_n > 0, the following inequality holds
(a1a2)n1+(a2a3)n1++(an1an)n1+(ana1)n1a12+a22++an2a12a22an2n. \left(\frac{a_1}{a_2}\right)^{n-1} + \left(\frac{a_2}{a_3}\right)^{n-1} + \dots + \left(\frac{a_{n-1}}{a_n}\right)^{n-1} + \left(\frac{a_n}{a_1}\right)^{n-1} \geq \frac{a_1^2 + a_2^2 + \dots + a_n^2}{\sqrt[n]{a_1^2 a_2^2 \dots a_n^2}}.
This inequality is obtained by adding the inequality below with its analogues obtained by cyclic permutation of the variables:
(n1)(a1a2)n1+(n2)(a2a3)n1++(an1an)n1n(n1)2((a1a2)n1(a2a3)n2(an1an)2n)==n(n1)2(a1na1a2a3an)2n. \begin{aligned} & (n-1) \cdot \left(\frac{a_1}{a_2}\right)^{n-1} + (n-2) \cdot \left(\frac{a_2}{a_3}\right)^{n-1} + \dots + \left(\frac{a_{n-1}}{a_n}\right)^{n-1} \geq \\ & \geq \frac{n(n-1)}{2} \cdot \left( \left(\frac{a_1}{a_2}\right)^{n-1} \left(\frac{a_2}{a_3}\right)^{n-2} \dots \left(\frac{a_{n-1}}{a_n}\right)^{\frac{2}{n}} \right) = \\ & = \frac{n(n-1)}{2} \left( \frac{a_1^n}{a_1 a_2 a_3 \dots a_n} \right)^{\frac{2}{n}}. \end{aligned}
Equality holds if all the numbers are equal to 11.

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Source: MathNet, licensed CC-BY-4.0. Statement and solution reproduced as published; topic and difficulty added by this site.