Maths Olympiad Prep

Track / Stage 5 / 88 of 400 #688 of 1964

Problem 688

AIME late
Geometry Difficulty 5.3 Find the answer

99.2. Consider 7-gons inscribed in a circle such that all sides of the 7-gon are of different length. Determine the maximal number of 120120^{\circ} angles in this kind of a 7-gon.

A number or a short expression. Spacing, $ signs and \frac vs / are all fine.

Official solution

Solution. It is easy to give examples of heptagons ABCDEFGA B C D E F G inscribed in a circle with all sides unequal and two angles equal to 120120^{\circ}. These angles cannot lie on adjacent vertices of the heptagon. In fact, if ABC=BCD=120\angle A B C=\angle B C D=120^{\circ}, and arc BCB C equals bb^{\circ}, then arcs ABA B and CDC D both are 120b120^{\circ}-b^{\circ} (compute angles in isosceles triangles with center of the circle as the to vertex), and AB=CDA B=C D, contrary to the assumption. So if the heptagon has three angles of 120120^{\circ}, their vertices are, say A,CA, C, and EE. Then each of the arcs GAB,BCDG A B, B C D, DEFD E F are 360240=120360^{\circ}-240^{\circ}=120^{\circ}. The arcs are disjoint, so they cover the whole circumference. The FF has to coincide with GG, and the heptagon degenerates to a hexagon. There can be at most two 120120^{\circ} angles.

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