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Algebra Difficulty 7.2 National olympiad, round 2 Prove it

Example 8 Let OxyzO x y z be a spatial rectangular coordinate system, SS be a finite set of points in space, and Sx,Sy,SzS_{x}, S_{y}, S_{z} be the sets formed by the orthogonal projections of all points in SS onto the OyzO y z plane, OzxO z x plane, and OxyO x y plane, respectively. Prove:
S2SxSySz|S|^{2} \leqslant\left|S_{x}\right| \cdot\left|S_{y}\right| \cdot\left|S_{z}\right|

Note The orthogonal projection of a point onto a plane refers to the foot of the perpendicular from the point to the plane.

Solution

Proof: Let there be nn planes parallel to the OxyOxy plane containing points from SS, denoted as M1,M2,,MnM_{1}, M_{2}, \cdots, M_{n}. For the plane Mi,1inM_{i}, 1 \leqslant i \leqslant n, let it intersect the Ozx,OzyOzx, Ozy planes at lines lyl_{y} and lxl_{x}, respectively, and let MiM_{i} contain mim_{i} points from SS. Clearly, miSzm_{i} \leqslant\left|S_{z}\right|.

Let the sets of orthogonal projections of points on MiM_{i} onto lxl_{x} and lyl_{y} be AiA_{i} and BiB_{i}, respectively, and let ai=Aia_{i}=\left|A_{i}\right|, bi=Bib_{i}=\left|B_{i}\right|. Then, miaibim_{i} \leqslant a_{i} b_{i}. Furthermore, since
i=1nai=Sy,i=1nbi=Sx,i=1nmi=S,\sum_{i=1}^{n} a_{i}=\left|S_{y}\right|, \sum_{i=1}^{n} b_{i}=\left|S_{x}\right|, \sum_{i=1}^{n} m_{i}=|S|,

by the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality, we have
SxSySz=(i=1nbi)(i=1nai)Sz(i=1naibi)2Sz=(i=1naibiSz)2(i=1nmi)2=S2\begin{aligned} \left|S_{x}\right| \cdot\left|S_{y}\right| \cdot\left|S_{z}\right| & =\left(\sum_{i=1}^{n} b_{i}\right)\left(\sum_{i=1}^{n} a_{i}\right) \cdot\left|S_{z}\right| \\ & \geqslant\left(\sum_{i=1}^{n} \sqrt{a_{i} b_{i}}\right)^{2} \cdot\left|S_{z}\right| \\ & =\left(\sum_{i=1}^{n} \sqrt{a_{i} b_{i}\left|S_{z}\right|}\right)^{2} \\ & \geqslant\left(\sum_{i=1}^{n} m_{i}\right)^{2}=|S|^{2} \end{aligned}

Thus, the proof is complete.

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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.