Maths Olympiad Prep

Library / /6 of 27

Algebra Difficulty 5.7 AIME, harder Prove it Czech-Polish-Slovak Mathematical Match

Find all quadruplets (a,b,c,d)(a, b, c, d) of real numbers satisfying the system
(a+b)(a2+b2)=(c+d)(c2+d2),(a+c)(a2+c2)=(b+d)(b2+d2),(a+d)(a2+d2)=(b+c)(b2+c2). \begin{aligned} (a + b)(a^2 + b^2) &= (c + d)(c^2 + d^2), \\ (a + c)(a^2 + c^2) &= (b + d)(b^2 + d^2), \\ (a + d)(a^2 + d^2) &= (b + c)(b^2 + c^2). \end{aligned}

Solution

Let us set
f(x,y)=(x+y)(x2+y2). f(x, y) = (x + y)(x^2 + y^2).
We'll show that for any real xx the inequality yzy \ge z implies f(x,y)f(x,z)f(x, y) \ge f(x, z). After subtraction we see that
f(x,y)f(x,z)=12(yz)((x+y)2+(y+z)2+(z+x)2)0. f(x, y) - f(x, z) = \frac{1}{2}(y - z)((x + y)^2 + (y + z)^2 + (z + x)^2) \ge 0.
Moreover, equality occurs when y=zy = z or x=y=z=0x = y = z = 0, so either way it implies y=zy = z.

We can rewrite the system (implicitly using the symmetry of ff) to the form:
f(a,b)=f(c,d)f(a,c)=f(b,d)f(a,d)=f(b,c) \begin{aligned} f(a, b) &= f(c, d) \\ f(a, c) &= f(b, d) \\ f(a, d) &= f(b, c) \end{aligned}
Now we can see that the system is symmetric in variables a,b,c,da, b, c, d and may assume a=max{a,b,c,d}a = \max\{a, b, c, d\}. We then write the chain of (in)equalities
f(c,d)=f(a,b)f(c,b)=f(a,d)f(b,d)=f(a,c)f(d,c) f(c, d) = f(a, b) \ge f(c, b) = f(a, d) \ge f(b, d) = f(a, c) \ge f(d, c)
and since we in fact have equality everywhere, we deduce a=b=c=da = b = c = d.
All such quadruplets clearly satisfy the system so the problem is solved. □

Want a route through all this instead of an archive? The track puts 2,000 problems in a working order, from AMC 10 level to the IMO shortlist.

Source: MathNet, licensed CC-BY-4.0. Statement and solution reproduced as published; topic and difficulty added by this site.