AlgebraDifficulty 7.8National olympiad, round 2Find the answer
Find a nonzero polynomial P(x,y) such that P(⌊a⌋,⌊2a⌋)=0 for all real numbers a. (Note: ⌊ν⌋ is the greatest integer less than or equal to ν.)
A number or a short expression. Spacing and $ signs are ignored.
Solution
Take P(x,y)=(y−2x)(y−2x−1). To see that this works, first note that if m=⌊a⌋, then 2m is an integer less than or equal to 2a, so 2m≤⌊2a⌋. On the other hand, m+1 is an integer strictly greater than a, so 2m+2 is an integer strictly greater than 2a, so ⌊2a⌋≤2m+1.
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