Maths Olympiad Prep

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, 2007

Geometry Difficulty 4.7 AIME Prove it Japan

A quadrilateral ABCDABCD that satisfies AB=5AB = 5, BC=7BC = 7, CD=6CD = 6 is given. And ACAC and BDBD are perpendicular to each other. Find the length of DADA.

Solution

Define PP as the intersection point of ACAC and BDBD. Then from the Pythagorean theorem, AB2=AP2+BP2AB^2 = AP^2 + BP^2, BC2=BP2+CP2BC^2 = BP^2 + CP^2, CD2=CP2+DP2CD^2 = CP^2 + DP^2, DA2=DP2+AP2DA^2 = DP^2 + AP^2. Then DA2=AB2+CD2BC2=52+6272=12DA^2 = AB^2 + CD^2 - BC^2 = 5^2 + 6^2 - 7^2 = 12. So DA=23DA = 2\sqrt{3}.

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