Maths Olympiad Prep

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Geometry Difficulty 4.9 AIME Prove it United States

Problem:

Penta chooses 5 of the vertices of a unit cube. What is the maximum possible volume of the figure whose vertices are the 5 chosen points?

Solution

Solution:

The answer is 12\frac{1}{2}.

Label the vertices of the cube A,B,C,D,E,F,G,HA, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, such that ABCDABCD is the top face of the cube, EE is directly below AA, FF is directly below BB, GG is directly below CC, and HH is directly below DD.

We can obtain a volume of 12\frac{1}{2} by taking the vertices A,B,C,FA, B, C, F, and HH.

To compute the volume of ABCFHABCFH, we will instead compute the volume of the parts of the cube that are not part of ABCFHABCFH. This is just the three tetrahedrons CFGHCFGH, AEFHAEFH, and ACDHACDH, which each have volume 16\frac{1}{6} (by using the 13bh\frac{1}{3}bh formula for the volume of a pyramid).

Therefore, the volume not contained in ABCFHABCFH is 316=123 \cdot \frac{1}{6} = \frac{1}{2}, so the volume contained in ABCFHABCFH is 112=121 - \frac{1}{2} = \frac{1}{2}.

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