Let be a cyclic quadrilateral with . The diagonals intersect at the point and lines and intersect at the point . Let and be the orthogonal projections of onto lines and respectively, and let and be the midpoints of and respectively. Prove that the second intersection point of the circumcircles of triangles and lies on the segment .
Solution
Let be the midpoint of . We will prove that the circumcircles of the triangles and pass through . (1)
First will prove that the circumcircle of passes through .
Let be the midpoint of . Note that the circumcircle of is the Euler circle (2) of the triangle , so it passes also through
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We will prove that
Indeed, since is right-angled and is its median, we have that and
In addition, since and are the midpoints of and we have that and similarly, since and are the midpoints of and , so .
It follows that the angles and have parallel sides, and since , they are acute, and as a result we have that
But, from the cyclic quadrilateral , we get that
Now, from (2),(3) and (4) we obtain immediately (1), so the quadrilateral is cyclic. Since from , its circumcircle passes also through , we get that the points are cocylic and this means that the circumcircle of passes through .
Similarly, the circumcircle of passes also through and we have the desired.