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Geometry Difficulty 4.9 AIME Prove it

A,BA,B, and CC are three interior points of a sphere SS such that ABAB and ACAC are perpendicular to the diameter of SS through AA, and so that two spheres can be constructed through AA, BB, and CC which are both tangent to SS. Prove that the sum of their radii is equal to the radius of SS.

Solution

Let the two tangent spheres be S1S_1 and S2S_2, and let O,O1,O2O, O_1, O_2 and R,R1,R2R, R_1, R_2 be the origins and radii of S,S1,S2S, S_1, S_2 respectively. Then AOAO stands normal to the plane PP through ΔABC\Delta ABC. Because both spheres go through AA, BB, and CC, the line O1O2O_1 O_2 also stands normal to PP, meaning AOAO and O1O2O_1 O_2 are both coplanar and parallel. Therefore the problem can be flattened to the plane PP' through AA, OO, O1O_1 and O2O_2.

Let X,Y,Z,M,NX, Y, Z, M, N be points on PP' such that X=SOO1,Y=S1S2A,Z=SOO2,M=O1YAO,N=O2YAOX = S \cap O O_1, \quad Y = S_1 \cap S_2 \neq A, \quad Z = S \cap O O_2, \quad M = O_1 Y \cap AO, \quad N = O_2 Y \cap AO
Let JJ be the three circles radical center, meaning JXJX and JZJZ are tangent segments to SS and JAYJ \in AY.

Because YP    NAY=YAM=90,Y \in P \iff \angle NAY = \angle YAM = 90 ^{\circ}, we have that YN\overline{YN} and YM\overline{YM} are diameters.
This means that OZN=ZNY=JZY\angle OZN = \angle ZNY = \angle JZY and MXO=YMX=YXJ\angle MXO = \angle YMX= \angle YXJ.
And because ZNO=180AYZ=ZYJ\angle ZNO = 180^{\circ} - \angle AYZ = \angle ZYJ and OMX=180XYA=JYX,\angle OMX = 180^{\circ} -\angle XYA = \angle JYX, we have that ΔJZYΔOZN\Delta JZY \sim \Delta OZN and ΔJYXΔOMX\Delta JYX \sim \Delta OMX.
We then conclude that OM=OXJYJX=OZJYJZ=ON\overline{OM} = \overline{OX} \enspace \frac {\overline{JY} }{ \overline{JX}} = \overline{OZ} \enspace \frac {\overline{JY} }{ \overline{JZ}} = \overline{ON}

Let aba \top b denote line aa bisecting line segment bb.
Since O1O2MNO_1 O_2 || MN it follows that OYMNOYO1O2OY \, \top \, \overline{MN} \Rightarrow OY \, \top \, \overline{O_1 O_2}.
Similarly we have that O1O2YMO1O2OYO_1 O_2 \, \top \, \overline{YM} \Rightarrow O_1 O_2 \, \top \, \overline{OY}.
And so O1OO2YO_1 O O_2 Y is a parallelogram because OY\overline{OY} and O1O2\overline{O_1 O_2} bisect each other, meaning R=OZ=OO2+O2Z=O1Y+R2=R1+R2R = \overline{OZ} = \overline{O O_2} + \overline{O_2 Z} = \overline{O_1 Y}+ R_2 = R_1 + R_2

QuodEratDemonstrandumQuod \enspace Erat \enspace Demonstrandum

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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.