Maths Olympiad Prep

Library / /7 of 27

Algebra Difficulty 5.8 AIME, harder Find the answer

Find all triples (a,b,c)(a, b, c) of integers that satisfy the equations

a+b=c a + b = c and a2+b3=c2a^2 + b^3 = c^2

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

Solution

We are tasked with finding all triples (a,b,c)(a, b, c) of integers that satisfy the following equations:

a+b=c a + b = c
a2+b3=c2 a^2 + b^3 = c^2

First, substitute c=a+bc = a + b from the first equation into the second equation:

a2+b3=(a+b)2 a^2 + b^3 = (a + b)^2

Expanding (a+b)2(a + b)^2, we have:

a2+b3=a2+2ab+b2 a^2 + b^3 = a^2 + 2ab + b^2

Subtract a2a^2 from both sides:

b3=2ab+b2 b^3 = 2ab + b^2

Rearrange the terms:

b3b22ab=0 b^3 - b^2 - 2ab = 0

Factor the left-hand side:

b(b2b2a)=0 b(b^2 - b - 2a) = 0

From the factorization, we get two cases to consider:

### Case 1: b=0b = 0
- Substitute b=0b = 0 into the first equation a+b=ca + b = c, we get:
a+0=cc=a a + 0 = c \quad \Rightarrow \quad c = a
- Thus, one solution is:
(a,b,c)=(a,0,a) (a, b, c) = (a, 0, a)

### Case 2: b2b2a=0b^2 - b - 2a = 0
- Solve this quadratic equation for aa:
b2b2a=02a=b2ba=b2b2 b^2 - b - 2a = 0 \quad \Rightarrow \quad 2a = b^2 - b \quad \Rightarrow \quad a = \frac{b^2 - b}{2}

- Substitute a=b2b2a = \frac{b^2 - b}{2} back into the first equation a+b=ca + b = c:
b2b2+b=c \frac{b^2 - b}{2} + b = c
b2b+2b2=cb2+b2=c \frac{b^2 - b + 2b}{2} = c \quad \Rightarrow \quad \frac{b^2 + b}{2} = c
- Hence, another solution is:
(a,b,c)=(b2b2,b,b2+b2) (a, b, c) = \left( \frac{b^2 - b}{2}, b, \frac{b^2 + b}{2} \right)

Thus, the solutions for the integer triples (a,b,c)(a, b, c) are:
(a,0,a) or (b2b2,b,b2+b2) \boxed{(a, 0, a) \text{ or } \left( \frac{b^2 - b}{2}, b, \frac{b^2 + b}{2} \right)}

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