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Combinatorics Difficulty 6.6 National olympiad Prove it China

Find the smallest positive integer kk with the following property: for any kk element subset AA of the set S={1,2,,2012}S = \{1, 2, \dots, 2012\}, there exist three pairwise distinct elements a,b,ca, b, c of SS such that a+ba+b, b+cb+c, c+ac+a all belong to AA.

Solution

Without loss of generality, we may assume a<b<ca < b < c. Write x=a+bx = a+b, z=b+cz = b+c, y=a+cy = a+c, then x<y<zx < y < z, x+y>zx+y > z, and x+y+zx+y+z is even. On the other hand, if there exist x,y,zAx, y, z \in A such that x<y<zx < y < z, x+y>zx+y > z, and x+y+zx+y+z is even, set a=x+yz2a = \frac{x+y-z}{2}, b=x+zy2b = \frac{x+z-y}{2}, c=y+zx2c = \frac{y+z-x}{2}, it is clear that a,b,ca, b, c are pairwise distinct elements of SS, and x=a+bx = a+b, y=a+cy = a+c, z=b+cz = b+c.

The required property is equivalent to the following: for any kk-element subset AA of SS, there exist three elements x,y,zAx, y, z \in A such that
x<y<z, x+y>z,  and x+y+z is even.() x < y < z,\ x + y > z,\ \text{ and } x + y + z \text{ is even.}\quad (*)
If A={1,2,3,5,7,,2011}A = \{1, 2, 3, 5, 7, \dots, 2011\}, A=1007|A| = 1007, and AA does not contain three elements satisfying property ()(*). Therefore, k1008k \ge 1008.

We next prove that any 1008-element subset of SS contains three elements satisfying property ()(*).
We prove a general statement: For any integer n4n \ge 4, any (n+2)(n + 2)-element subset of {1,2,,2n}\{1, 2, \dots, 2n\} contains three elements satisfying ()(*). We induct on nn.

When n=4n = 4, let AA be a 6-element subset of {1,2,,8}\{1, 2, \dots, 8\}, then A{3,4,5,6,7,8}A \cap \{3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8\} contains at least four elements. If A{3,4,5,6,7,8}A \cap \{3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8\} contains three even numbers, then 4,6,8A4, 6, 8 \in A satisfying ()(*). If A{3,4,5,6,7,8}A \cap \{3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8\} contains exactly two even numbers, then it contains two odd numbers. For any two odd numbers x,yx, y of {3,5,7}\{3, 5, 7\}, two of (4,x,y)(4, x, y), (6,x,y)(6, x, y), (8,x,y)(8, x, y) would satisfy property ()(*), thus one of them is contained in AA. If A{3,4,5,6,7,8}A \cap \{3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8\} contains exactly one even number xx, then it contains all three odd numbers, then (x,5,7)(x, 5, 7) satisfies ()(*). The result holds for n=4n = 4.

Assuming the result holds for nn (n4n \ge 4), consider the case of n+1n + 1. Let AA be (n+3)(n + 3)-elements of {1,2,,2n+2}\{1, 2, \dots, 2n + 2\}, if A{1,2,,2n}n+2|A \cap \{1, 2, \dots, 2n\}| \ge n + 2. By inductive hypothesis, the result follows. It remains to consider A{1,2,,2n}=n+1|A \cap \{1, 2, \dots, 2n\}| = n + 1, and 2n+1,2n+2A2n + 1, 2n + 2 \in A. If AA contains an odd number xx in {1,2,,2n}\{1, 2, \dots, 2n\}, then x,2n+1,2n+2x, 2n + 1, 2n + 2 satisfy ()(*); if no odd number of {1,2,,2n}\{1, 2, \dots, 2n\} greater than 1 is contained in AA, then A={1,2,4,6,,2n,2n+1,2n+2}A = \{1, 2, 4, 6, \dots, 2n, 2n + 1, 2n + 2\}, and 4,6,8A4, 6, 8 \in A satisfy ()(*).

Hence, the smallest kk with the required property is 10081008.

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