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IRL ABooklet

Geometry Difficulty 4.4 AIME Prove it Ireland

A circle, centre II, lies inside a circle, centre JJ, and touches it at a point AA. A tangent is drawn to the circle, centre II, at a point BB different from AA which intersects the circle, centre JJ, at CC and DD. Prove that ABAB bisects ∠CAD\angle CAD.

Solutions — 2

Solution 1

Let TT be the point on the line CDCD for which TATA is the common tangent to both circles. Then ∣TA∣=∣TB∣|TA| = |TB|, because TBTB is a tangent to the smaller circle as well. Hence ∠TBA=∠TAB\angle TBA = \angle TAB.

Figure 1

Looking at triangle ABCABC we see that ∠TBA=∠BDA+∠BAD\angle TBA = \angle BDA + \angle BAD. Since ∠TAB=∠CAB+∠TAC\angle TAB = \angle CAB + \angle TAC and ∠TAC=∠BDA\angle TAC = \angle BDA by the alternate segment theorem, we get ∠TAB=∠CAB+∠BDA\angle TAB = \angle CAB + \angle BDA. Comparing the two expressions for ∠TBA=∠TAB\angle TBA = \angle TAB we obtain ∠CAB=∠BAD\angle CAB = \angle BAD, i.e. ABAB bisects ∠CAD\angle CAD.

Solution 2

The points AA, II, and JJ are collinear since IAIA and JAJA are both perpendicular to the common tangent at AA. Let EE be the second intersection point of ABAB with the circle centre JJ. Join IBIB and JEJE.

Figure 2

Because ∣IA∣=∣IB∣|IA| = |IB| we have ∠ABI=∠IAB\angle ABI = \angle IAB, and from ∣JA∣=∣JE∣|JA| = |JE| we get ∠AEJ=∠JAE\angle AEJ = \angle JAE. This implies ∠ABI=∠AEJ\angle ABI = \angle AEJ, hence IBIB is parallel to JEJE. As IBIB is perpendicular to the tangent CDCD, it follows that JEJE is perpendicular to the chord CDCD, i.e. EE is the midpoint of the arc CDCD and ∠CAE=∠DAE\angle CAE = \angle DAE, as required.

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