Let be an integer and let be a set of points in the plane whose coordinates both lie in . Find the minimal number of for which one can choose four points from that are the vertices of a nondegenerate parallelogram.
Solution
If , we can choose all points with -coordinate, -coordinate are . Then, clearly there is no parallelogram. Thus, any does not satisfy the condition.
Next, we will prove that satisfies. Indeed, let be the number of points whose -coordinate are respectively. Clearly
Consider the segments formed by connecting points with the same -coordinate. If there are points, then at least segments with different lengths will be generated (we take the point with the lowest ordinate and connect it to the remaining points). Thus, with , among the points with the same -coordinate , we can choose a set with size consists of segments with different lengths. If in there are two segments have the same length, it is easy to see that the four corresponding vertices will form a parallelogram, satisfying the problem.
Conversely, if there are no segments with the same length, then notice that
but the values in these sets are smaller than , because their length is the difference between two -coordinate, and these coordinates only belong to .
Obviously this is a contradiction.
Therefore the minimum value to find is .