Maths Olympiad Prep

Library / /29 of 48

, 2021

Geometry Difficulty 5.8 AIME, harder Prove it Hong Kong

Let SS be a set of 20202020 distinct points in the plane. Let
M={P:PM = \{P : P is the midpoint of XYXY for some distinct points X,YX, Y in S}S\}.
Find the least possible value of the number of points in MM.

Solution

There are at least 40374037 points in MM.
Since there are finitely many points in SS, we can find a coordinate system such that all points in SS have distinct xx-coordinates. Indeed, we just need to find a line which is not perpendicular to any line joining two of the points in SS.

Now, let the n=2020n = 2020 points be Pj=(xj,yj)P_j = (x_j, y_j) where j=1,2,,nj = 1, 2, \dots, n. WLOG assume x1<x2<<xnx_1 < x_2 < \dots < x_n. Since
x1+x22<x1+x32<<x1+xn2<x2+xn2<<xn1+xn2, \frac{x_1 + x_2}{2} < \frac{x_1 + x_3}{2} < \dots < \frac{x_1 + x_n}{2} < \frac{x_2 + x_n}{2} < \dots < \frac{x_{n-1} + x_n}{2},
the midpoints of P1P2,P1P3,,P1Pn,P2Pn,,Pn1PnP_1P_2, P_1P_3, \dots, P_1P_n, P_2P_n, \dots, P_{n-1}P_n have pairwise different xx-coordinates, and so they must be distinct. This shows M2n3=4037|M| \ge 2n - 3 = 4037.

The case 40374037 is attainable. For example, we choose the points 0,2,4,6,,2n20, 2, 4, 6, \dots, 2n-2 on the real number line. Then the midpoints can only be 1,2,3,,2n31, 2, 3, \dots, 2n-3. So there are exactly 2n3=40372n-3 = 4037 midpoints.

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