Maths Olympiad Prep

Library / /1 of 42

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.

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.