1985 AIME Problems/Problem 4

Problem

A small square is constructed inside a square of area 1 by dividing each side of the unit square into $n$ equal parts, and then connecting the vertices to the division points closest to the opposite vertices. Find the value of $n$ if the the area of the small square is exactly $\frac1{1985}$ .

Solution

The lines passing through $A$ and $C$ divide the square into three parts, two right triangles and a parallelogram. The area of the triangles together is easily seen to be $\frac{n - 1}{n}$ , so the area of the parallelogram is $A = \frac{1}{n}$ . By the Pythagorean Theorem, the base of the parallelogram has length $l = \sqrt{1^2 + \left(\frac{n - 1}{n}\right)^2} = \frac{1}{n}\sqrt{2n^2 - 2n + 1}$ , so the parallelogram has height $h = \frac{A}{l} = \frac{1}{\sqrt{2n^2 - 2n + 1}}$ . But the height of the parallelogram is the side of the little square, so $2n^2 - 2n + 1 = 1985$ . Solving this quadratic equation gives $n = 032$ .

1985 AIME (Problems • Answer Key • Resources)
Preceded by Problem 3	Followed by Problem 5
1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • 10 • 11 • 12 • 13 • 14 • 15
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1985 AIME Problems/Problem 4

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