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The 54th William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition Saturday, December 4, 1993

The document is the description of problems A1-A6 and B1-B6 from the 54th William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition. It provides the statements of 12 multi-part mathematical problems involving topics such as geometry, number theory, probability, and analysis.

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117 views1 page

The 54th William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition Saturday, December 4, 1993

The document is the description of problems A1-A6 and B1-B6 from the 54th William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition. It provides the statements of 12 multi-part mathematical problems involving topics such as geometry, number theory, probability, and analysis.

Uploaded by

Duck520
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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The 54th William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition

Saturday, December 4, 1993

A1 The horizontal line y = c intersects the curve y = 2x B1 Find the smallest positive integer n such that for every
3x3 in the first quadrant as in the figure. Find c so that integer m with 0 < m < 1993, there exists an integer k
the areas of the two shaded regions are equal. [Figure for which
not included. The first region is bounded by the y-axis,
the line y = c and the curve; the other lies under the m k m+1
< < .
curve and above the line y = c between their two points 1993 n 1994
of intersection.] B2 Consider the following game played with a deck of 2n
cards numbered from 1 to 2n. The deck is randomly
A2 Let (xn )n0 be a sequence of nonzero real numbers such shuffled and n cards are dealt to each of two players.
that xn2 xn1 xn+1 = 1 for n = 1, 2, 3, . . . . Prove there Beginning with A, the players take turns discarding one
exists a real number a such that xn+1 = axn xn1 for of their remaining cards and announcing its number.
all n 1. The game ends as soon as the sum of the numbers on the
discarded cards is divisible by 2n + 1. The last person
A3 Let Pn be the set of subsets of {1, 2, . . . , n}. Let c(n, m) to discard wins the game. Assuming optimal strategy
be the number of functions f : Pn {1, 2, . . . , m} such by both A and B, what is the probability that A wins?
that f (A B) = min{ f (A), f (B)}. Prove that
B3 Two real numbers x and y are chosen at random in the
m
c(n, m) = n
. interval (0,1) with respect to the uniform distribution.
j What is the probability that the closest integer to x/y is
j=1
even? Express the answer in the form r + s, where r
A4 Let x1 , x2 , . . . , x19 be positive integers each of which is and s are rational numbers.
less than or equal to 93. Let y1 , y2 , . . . , y93 be positive B4 The function K(x, y) is positive and continuous for 0
integers each of which is less than or equal to 19. Prove x 1, 0 y 1, and the functions f (x) and g(x) are
that there exists a (nonempty) sum of some xi s equal to positive and continuous for 0 x 1. Suppose that for
a sum of some y j s. all x, 0 x 1,
A5 Show that Z 1
2 f (y)K(x, y) dy = g(x)
x2 x
Z 10  0
3
dx+
100 x 3x + 1 and
Z 1  2
11 x2 x Z 1
dx+ g(y)K(x, y) dy = f (x).
1
101
x3 3x + 1 0
Z 11  2
10 x2 x Show that f (x) = g(x) for 9 x 1.
dx
101
100
x3 3x + 1
B5 Show there do not exist four points in the Euclidean
is a rational number. plane such that the pairwise distances between the
points are all odd integers.
A6 The infinite sequence of 2s and 3s
B6 Let S be a set of three, not necessarily distinct, posi-
2, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, tive integers. Show that one can transform S into a set
3, 2, 3, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 2, 3, 3, 3, 2, . . . containing 0 by a finite number of applications of the
following rule: Select two of the three integers, say x
has the property that, if one forms a second sequence and y, where x y and replace them with 2x and y x.
that records the number of 3s between successive 2s,
the result is identical to the given sequence. Show that
there exists a real number r such that, for any n, the nth
term of the sequence is 2 if and only if n = 1 + brmc
for some nonnegative integer m. (Note: bxc denotes the
largest integer less than or equal to x.)

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