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Geometry Difficulty 8.9 Shortlist Prove it Turkey

A line dd is said to *focus* a triangle TT if there exists a point on the plane whose projections on the edges of the triangle TT all lie on the line dd. Triangles T1T_1 and T2T_2 are *equivalent* if the set of focusing lines of T1T_1 is identical to the set of focusing lines of T2T_2. For any given triangle TT on the plane, prove that there exists exactly one equilateral triangle equivalent to TT.

Solution

First, note that the focusing lines of a triangle are its Simson lines. We will make use of the following well-known lemmas about Simson lines and we state them without proof.

Lemma 1. Fix a triangle. Let PP be a point on the circumcircle and let HH be the orthocenter. The Simson line associated to PP passes through the midpoint of [PH][PH].

Lemma 2. Let P1,P2P_1, P_2 be points on the circumcircle. Let 1,2\ell_1, \ell_2 be the Simson lines associated to P1,P2P_1, P_2 respectively. Then, one has
(1,2)=12P1P2 \angle(\ell_1, \ell_2) = \frac{1}{2} \cdot \overline{P_1 P_2}

We now set a notation convention: Let PP be a point on the 9-point circle. Denote the reflection of HH across PP by Pˉ\bar{P}. Note that Pˉ\bar{P} is on the circumcircle. Consider the Simson line associated to Pˉ\bar{P}, which passes through PP (by Lemma 1). Let this line intersect the 9-point circle at PP' other than PP. For any point QQ on the 9-point circle, let Qˉ\bar{Q} and QQ' be defined similarly.

In this notation, Lemma 2 appears as
(PP,QQ)=12QPˉPQ=2QPˉ \angle(PP', QQ') = \frac{1}{2} \cdot \overline{Q\bar{P}} \Leftrightarrow \overline{P'Q'} = 2 \cdot \overline{Q\bar{P}}

Exactly 3 of the Simson lines are tangent to the 9-point circle.

Indeed, line RRRR' is tangent to the 9-point circle iff
R=RPR=2RPPR=3RP R = R' \Leftrightarrow \overrightarrow{PR} = 2 \cdot \overrightarrow{RP} \Leftrightarrow \overrightarrow{PR} = 3 \cdot \overrightarrow{RP}
where the last equation is satisfied by exactly 3 points RR on the circle, clearly. These 3 points are spaced equally around the circle.

Let the 9-point circle together with these 3 equally spaced points marked on it be called *the marked 9-point circle*. Therefore, given the marked 9-point circle of a triangle, all the Simson lines are determined. Take a triangle and consider its marked 9-point circle Ω\Omega and the equilateral triangle formed by the tangent lines at the marked points. Then, the marked 9-point circle of this equilateral triangle is the same as Ω\Omega. Therefore, this equilateral triangle is equivalent to the original triangle. Furthermore, an equilateral triangle can be uniquely determined by its set of Simson lines, so the conclusion follows.

The last claim is justified as follows: Note that the sides of any triangle are among its Simson lines, thus given a full set of Simson lines, one must consider the equilateral triangles that can be formed by these lines in order to find the equilateral triangle that produced this set of Simson lines. Among these equilateral triangles, only the largest one produces this set of Simson lines.

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