Maths Olympiad Prep

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Geometry Difficulty 5.5 AIME, harder Find the answer United States

Problem:
On the perimeter of a unit circle, 12 points are chosen uniformly and independently at random. Estimate the expected value of the area of the convex 12-gon formed by these points.

Submit a positive number EE written in decimal. If the correct answer is AA, you will receive round (20e15EA)\left(20e^{-15|E - A|}\right) points.

A number or a short expression. Fractions can be typed as 3/2, and spacing doesn't matter.

Solution

Solution:
We compute the exact answer as given above. Let n=12n = 12, and θ1,θ2,,θn\theta_{1}, \theta_{2}, \ldots, \theta_{n} be uniformly randomly generated such that θ1++θn=2π\theta_{1} + \cdots + \theta_{n} = 2\pi. We are trying to estimate

E[12i=1nsin(θi)]=12i=1nE[sin(θi)]. \mathbb{E}\left[\frac{1}{2}\sum_{i = 1}^{n}\sin (\theta_{i})\right] = \frac{1}{2}\sum_{i = 1}^{n}\mathbb{E}[\sin (\theta_{i})].

We do this by computing the marginal distribution of θi\theta_{i}, which is proportional to the area of the n2n - 2 dimensional cross section

jiθj=2πθi. \sum_{j\neq i}\theta_{j} = 2\pi -\theta_{i}.

The volume of this cross section is proportional to (2πθi)n2(2\pi - \theta_{i})^{n - 2}. Thus, the marginal probability distribution of θi\theta_{i} can be written as

p(θi)=C(2πθi)n2 p(\theta_{i}) = C(2\pi -\theta_{i})^{n - 2}

for some constant CC. We can solve for CC because we know 02πp(θi)dθi=1\int_{0}^{2\pi}p(\theta_{i})d\theta_{i} = 1. The result is that

p(θi)=n12π(1θi2π)n2. p(\theta_{i}) = \frac{n - 1}{2\pi}\left(1 - \frac{\theta_{i}}{2\pi}\right)^{n - 2}.

Thus, the quantity that we seek to estimate is

E[12i=1nsinθi]=n2E[sinθi] \mathbb{E}\left[\frac{1}{2}\sum_{i = 1}^{n}\sin \theta_{i}\right] = \frac{n}{2}\mathbb{E}[\sin \theta_{i}]
=n02πp(θi)sinθidθi \qquad = n\int_{0}^{2\pi}p(\theta_{i})\sin \theta_{i}d\theta_{i}
=n(n1)4π02π(1θ2π)n2sinθdθ \qquad = \frac{n(n - 1)}{4\pi}\int_{0}^{2\pi}\left(1 - \frac{\theta}{2\pi}\right)^{n - 2}\sin \theta d\theta
=33π02π(1θ2π)10sinθdθ. \qquad = \frac{33}{\pi}\int_{0}^{2\pi}\left(1 - \frac{\theta}{2\pi}\right)^{10}\sin \theta d\theta.

We can integrate this using tabular integration by parts.

DifferentiateIntegrateSign
(1θ/2π)10(1-\theta/2\pi)^{10}sinθ\sin\theta
5/π(1θ/2π)9-5/\pi(1-\theta/2\pi)^9cosθ\cos\theta+
45/2π(1θ/2π)845/2\pi(1-\theta/2\pi)^8sinθ-\sin\theta-
90/π(1θ/2π)7-90/\pi(1-\theta/2\pi)^7cosθ-\cos\theta+
315/π(1θ/2π)6315/\pi(1-\theta/2\pi)^6sinθ\sin\theta-
945/π(1θ/2π)5-945/\pi(1-\theta/2\pi)^5cosθ\cos\theta+
4725/2π(1θ/2π)44725/2\pi(1-\theta/2\pi)^4sinθ-\sin\theta-
4725/π(1θ/2π)34725/\pi(1-\theta/2\pi)^3cosθ-\cos\theta+
14175/2π(1θ/2π)214175/2\pi(1-\theta/2\pi)^2sinθ\sin\theta-
14175/2π(1θ/2π)114175/2\pi(1-\theta/2\pi)^1cosθ\cos\theta+
14175/4π1014175/4\pi^{10}sinθ-\sin\theta-
cosθ\cos\theta+

To compute the product, note that any term of the form C(1θ2π)nsinθC\left(1 - \frac{\theta}{2\pi}\right)^{n} \sin \theta vanishes when taking definite integral from 00 to 2π2\pi. Therefore, the desired value is

33π((1θ2π)10452π2(1θ2π)8+315π4(1θ2π)647252π6(1θ2π)4 \frac{33}{\pi}\left((1 - \frac{\theta}{2\pi})^{10} - \frac{45}{2\pi^{2}}\left(1 - \frac{\theta}{2\pi}\right)^{8} + \frac{315}{\pi^{4}}\left(1 - \frac{\theta}{2\pi}\right)^{6} - \frac{4725}{2\pi^{6}}\left(1 - \frac{\theta}{2\pi}\right)^{4} \right.
\qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad
+141752π8(1θ2π)2+141754π10)cosθ02π \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \qquad \left. + \frac{14175}{2\pi^{8}}\left(1 - \frac{\theta}{2\pi}\right)^{2} + \frac{14175}{4\pi^{10}}\right)\cos \theta \bigg|_{0}^{2\pi}

=33π(1452π2+315π447252π6+141752π8) \qquad = \frac{33}{\pi}\left(1 - \frac{45}{2\pi^{2}} +\frac{315}{\pi^{4}} -\frac{4725}{2\pi^{6}} +\frac{14175}{2\pi^{8}}\right)
=[33π14852π3+10395π5155925π7+4677752π9] \qquad = \left[\frac{33}{\pi} -\frac{1485}{2\pi^{3}} +\frac{10395}{\pi^{5}} -\frac{155925}{\pi^{7}} +\frac{467775}{2\pi^{9}}\right]

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