2003 AIME I Problems/Problem 8

Problem 8

In an increasing sequence of four positive integers, the first three terms form an arithmetic progression, the last three terms form a geometric progression, and the first and fourth terms differ by 30. Find the sum of the four terms.

Solution

Denote the first term as $a$ , and the common difference between the first three terms as $d$ . The four numbers thus resemble $\displaystyle a,\ a+d,\ a+2d,\ \frac{(a + 2d)^2}{a + d}$ .

Since the first and fourth terms differ by 30, we can write that $\frac{(a + 2d)^2}{a + d} - a = 30$ . Multiplying out by the denominator, we get that $\displaystyle (a + 4ad + 4d^2) - a(a + d) = 30(a + d)$ . This simplifies to $\displaystyle 3ad + 4d^2 = 30a + 30d$ . Rearrange the terms to find that $\displaystyle 2d(2d - 15) = 3a(10 - d)$ .

Both $a$ and $d$ are positive integers, so $2d - 15$ and $10 - d$ must have the same sign. Try if they are both positive (notice if they are both negative, then $\displaystyle d > 10$ and $d < \frac{15}{2}$ , which clearly is a contradiction). Then, $d = 8, 9$ . Directly substituting and testing shows that $\displaystyle d \neq 8$ , but that if $d = 9$ then $a = 18$ . Hence, the four terms are $18,\ 27,\ 36,\ 48$ , which indeed fits the given conditions. Their sum is $129$ .

2003 AIME I (Problems • Answer Key • Resources)
Preceded by Problem 7	Followed by Problem 9
1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • 10 • 11 • 12 • 13 • 14 • 15
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2003 AIME I Problems/Problem 8

Problem 8

Solution

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