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Geometry Difficulty 6.4 National olympiad Find the answer

Consider a rectangle whose lengths of sides are natural numbers. If someone places as many squares as possible, each with area 3, inside of the given rectangle, such that the sides of the squares are parallel to the rectangle sides, then the maximal number of these squares fill exactly half of the area of the rectangle. Determine the dimensions of all rectangles with this property.

A number or a short expression. Fractions can be typed as 3/2, and spacing doesn't matter.

Solution

Let ABCDA B C D be a rectangle with AB=mA B=m and AD=nA D=n where m,nm, n are natural numbers such that mn2m \geq n \geq 2. Suppose that inside of the rectangle ABCDA B C D is placed a rectangular lattice consisting of some identical squares whose areas are equal to 3, where kk of them are placed along the side ABA B and ll of them along the side ADA D.

The sum of areas of all of these squares is equal to 3kl3 k l. Besides the obvious conditions k3mk \sqrt{3} \leq m and (l+1)3>n(l+1) \sqrt{3} > n (2).

The proposed problem is to determine all pairs (m,n)N×N(m, n) \in \mathbb{N} \times \mathbb{N} with mn2m \geq n \geq 2, for which the ratio Rm,n=3klmnR_{m, n}=\frac{3 k l}{m n} is equal to 0.5 where k,lk, l are natural numbers determined by the conditions (1) and (2).

Observe that for n6n \geq 6, using (2), we get Rm,n=k3l3mn>(m3)(n3)mn=R_{m, n}=\frac{k \sqrt{3} \cdot l \sqrt{3}}{m n}>\frac{(m-\sqrt{3})(n-\sqrt{3})}{m n}= (13m)(13n)(136)2=12+71233>12+481233=0.5\left(1-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{m}\right)\left(1-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{n}\right) \geq\left(1-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{6}\right)^{2}=\frac{1}{2}+\frac{7}{12}-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{3}>\frac{1}{2}+\frac{\sqrt{48}}{12}-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{3}=0.5

So, the condition Rm,n=0.5R_{m, n}=0.5 yields n5n \leq 5 or n{2,3,4,5}n \in\{2,3,4,5\}. We have 4 possible cases:

Case 1: n=2n=2. Then l=1l=1 and thus as above we get Rm,2=3k2m>3(m3)2m=R_{m, 2}=\frac{3 k}{2 m}>\frac{\sqrt{3} \cdot(m-\sqrt{3})}{2 m}= 32(13m)\frac{\sqrt{3}}{2} \cdot\left(1-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{m}\right), which is greater than 0.5 for each m>27+32>5+32=4m>\frac{\sqrt{27}+3}{2}>\frac{5+3}{2}=4, hence m{2,3,4}m \in\{2,3,4\}. Direct calculations give R2,2=R2,4=0.75R_{2,2}=R_{2,4}=0.75 and R2,3=0.5R_{2,3}=0.5.

Case 2: n=3n=3. Then l=1l=1 and thus as above we get Rm,3=3k3m>3(m3)3m=R_{m, 3}=\frac{3 k}{3 m}>\frac{\sqrt{3} \cdot(m-\sqrt{3})}{3 m}= 33(13m)\frac{\sqrt{3}}{3} \cdot\left(1-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{m}\right), which is greater than 0.5 for each m>43+6>12m>4 \sqrt{3}+6>12, hence mm \in {3,4,,12}\{3,4, \ldots, 12\}. Direct calculations give R3,3=0.(3),R3,5=0.4,R3,7=4/7,R3,9=R_{3,3}=0.(3), R_{3,5}=0.4, R_{3,7}=4 / 7, R_{3,9}= 5/9,R3,11=6/115 / 9, R_{3,11}=6 / 11 and R3,4=R3,6=R3,8=R3,10=R3,12=0.5R_{3,4}=R_{3,6}=R_{3,8}=R_{3,10}=R_{3,12}=0.5.

Case 3: n=4n=4. Then l=2l=2 and thus as above we get Rm,4=6k4m>3(m3)2m=R_{m, 4}=\frac{6 k}{4 m}>\frac{\sqrt{3} \cdot(m-\sqrt{3})}{2 m}= 32(13m)\frac{\sqrt{3}}{2} \cdot\left(1-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{m}\right), which is greater than 0.5 for each m>27+32>5+32=4m>\frac{\sqrt{27}+3}{2}>\frac{5+3}{2}=4.

Hence m=4m=4 and a calculation gives R4,4=0.75R_{4,4}=0.75.

Case 4: n=5n=5. Then l=2l=2 and thus as above we get Rm,5=6k5m>23(m3)5m=R_{m, 5}=\frac{6 k}{5 m}>\frac{2 \sqrt{3} \cdot(m-\sqrt{3})}{5 m}= 235(13m)\frac{2 \sqrt{3}}{5} \cdot\left(1-\frac{\sqrt{3}}{m}\right), which is greater than 0.5 for each m>12(43+5)23>121123>6m>\frac{12(4 \sqrt{3}+5)}{23}>\frac{12 \cdot 11}{23}>6, hence m{5,6}m \in\{5,6\}. Direct calculations give R5,5=0.48R_{5,5}=0.48 and R5,6=0.6R_{5,6}=0.6.

We conclude that: Ri,j=0.5R_{i, j}=0.5 for (i,j){(2,3);(3,4);(3,6);(3,8);(3,10);(3,12)}(i, j) \in\{(2,3) ;(3,4) ;(3,6) ;(3,8) ;(3,10) ;(3,12)\}.

These pairs are the dimensions of all rectangles with the desired property.

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Source: NuminaMath-1.5, licensed Apache-2.0. Statement and solution reproduced as published; topic and difficulty added by this site.