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Geometry Difficulty 4.8 AIME Prove it Brazil

We have a red cube with sidelength 22 cm. What is the minimum number of identical cubes that must be adjoined to the red cube in order to obtain a cube with volume (125)3\left(\frac{12}{5}\right)^3 cm?

Solution

The bigger cube has sidelength 125\frac{12}{5} cm, so the difference between the side-lengths is 1252=25\frac{12}{5} - 2 = \frac{2}{5} cm, that is, the red cubes should not have sidelength greater than this length. Cubes with sidelength 25\frac{2}{5} cm are the natural candidates, so we set a new unit u=25u = \frac{2}{5} cm. Notice that the bigger cube should have sidelength 6u6u and the original cube must have sidelength 5u5u. So we need 6353=916^3 - 5^3 = 91 red cubes.

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