Maths Olympiad Prep

Library / /230 of 520

Algebra Difficulty 5.2 AIME, harder Find the answer

9. Let the function be
2f(x)+x2f(1x)=3x3x2+4x+3x+1 2 f(x)+x^{2} f\left(\frac{1}{x}\right)=\frac{3 x^{3}-x^{2}+4 x+3}{x+1} \text {. }

Then f(x)=f(x)= \qquad .

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

Solution

9. x23x+65x+1x^{2}-3 x+6-\frac{5}{x+1}.

Let x=1yx=\frac{1}{y}, we get
f(y)+2y2f(1y)=3y3+4y2y+3y+1. f(y)+2 y^{2} f\left(\frac{1}{y}\right)=\frac{3 y^{3}+4 y^{2}-y+3}{y+1} .

Substitute yy with xx to get
f(x)+2x2f(1x)=3x3+4x2x+3x+1 f(x)+2 x^{2} f\left(\frac{1}{x}\right)=\frac{3 x^{3}+4 x^{2}-x+3}{x+1} \text {. }

Also, 2f(x)+x2f(1x)=3x3x2+4x+3x+12 f(x)+x^{2} f\left(\frac{1}{x}\right)=\frac{3 x^{3}-x^{2}+4 x+3}{x+1}.
By eliminating f(1x)f\left(\frac{1}{x}\right) from the above two equations, we obtain f(x)f(x).

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