2001 AIME I Problems/Problem 14

Problem

A mail carrier delivers mail to the nineteen houses on the east side of Elm Street. The carrier notices that no two adjacent houses ever get mail on the same day, but that there are never more than two houses in a row that get no mail on the same day. How many different patterns of mail delivery are possible?

Solution

Let $0$ represent a house that does not receive mail and $1$ represent a house that does receive mail. This problem is now asking for the number of $19$ -digit strings of $0$ 's and $1$ 's such that there are no two consecutive $1$ 's and no three consecutive $0$ 's.

The last two digits of any $n$ -digit string can't be $11$ , so the only possibilities are $00$ , $01$ , and $10$ .

Let $a_n$ be the number of $n$ -digit strings ending in $00$ , $b_n$ be the number of $n$ -digit strings ending in $01$ , and $c_n$ be the number of $n$ -digit strings ending in $10$ .

If an $n$ -digit string ends in $00$ , then the previous digit must be a $1$ , and the last two digits of the $n-1$ digits substring will be $10$ . So $a_{n} = c_{n-1}.$

If an $n$ -digit string ends in $01$ , then the previous digit can be either a $0$ or a $1$ , and the last two digits of the $n-1$ digits substring can be either $00$ or $10$ . So $b_{n} = a_{n-1} + c_{n-1}.$

If an $n$ -digit string ends in $10$ , then the previous digit must be a $0$ , and the last two digits of the $n-1$ digits substring will be $01$ . So $c_{n} = b_{n-1}.$

Clearly, $a_2=b_2=c_2=1$ . Using the recursive equations and initial values:

\[\begin{tabular}[t]{|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|c|}
\multicolumn{19}{c}{}\\\hline
n&2&3&4&5&6&7&8&9&10&11&12&13&14&15&16&17&18&19\\\hline
a_n&1&1&1&2&2&3&4&5&7&9&12&16&21&28&37&49&65&86\\\hline
b_n&1&2&2&3&4&5&7&9&12&16&21&28&37&49&65&86&114&151\\\hline
c_n&1&1&2&2&3&4&5&7&9&12&16&21&28&37&49&65&86&114\\\hline
\end{tabular}\] (Error compiling LaTeX. Unknown error_msg)

Therefore, the number of $19$ -digit strings is $a_{19}+b_{19}+c_{19} = 86+151+114 = \boxed{351}.$

2001 AIME I (Problems • Answer Key • Resources)
Preceded by Problem 13	Followed by Problem 15
1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • 10 • 11 • 12 • 13 • 14 • 15
All AIME Problems and Solutions

Page

Toolbox

Search

2001 AIME I Problems/Problem 14

Problem

Solution

See also