2016 AIME II Problems/Problem 9

The sequences of positive integers $1,a_2, a_3,...$ and $1,b_2, b_3,...$ are an increasing arithmetic sequence and an increasing geometric sequence, respectively. Let $c_n=a_n+b_n$ . There is an integer $k$ such that $c_{k-1}=100$ and $c_{k+1}=1000$ . Find $c_k$ .

Solution

Since all the terms of the sequences are integers, and 100 isn't very big, we should just try out the possibilities for $b_2$ . When we get to $b_2=9$ and $a_2=91$ , we have $a_4=271$ and $b_4=729$ , which works, therefore, the answer is $b_3+a_3=81+181=\boxed{262}$ .

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2016 AIME II Problems/Problem 9

Solution