2015 AIME I Problems/Problem 7

Problem

7. In the diagram below, $ABCD$ is a square. Point $E$ is the midpoint of $\overline{AD}$ . Points $F$ and $G$ lie on $\overline{CE}$ , and $H$ and $J$ lie on $\overline{AB}$ and $\overline{BC}$ , respectively, so that $FGHJ$ is a square. Points $K$ and $L$ lie on $\overline{GH}$ , and $M$ and $N$ lie on $\overline{AD}$ and $\overline{AB}$ , respectively, so that $KLMN$ is a square. The area of $KLMN$ is 99. Find the area of $FGHJ$ .

Solution

We begin by denoting the length $ED$ $a$ , giving us $DC = 2a$ and $EC = a\sqrt5$ . Since angles $\angle DCE$ and $\angle FCJ$ are complimentary, we have that $\triangle CDE ~ \triangle JFC$ (and similarly the rest of the triangles are $1-2-\sqrt5$ triangles). We let the sidelength of $FGHJ$ be $b$ , giving us:

$JC = \sqrt5 \cdot FC = \sqrt5 \cdot FJ/2 = \frac{b\sqrt 5}{2}$ and $BJ = \frac{1}{\sqrt5} \cdot HJ = \frac{b}{\sqrt5}$ .

Since $BC = CJ + JC$ ,

$2a = \frac{b\sqrt 5}{2} + \frac{b}{\sqrt5}$ ,

Solving for $b$ in terms of $a$ yields $b = \frac{4a\sqrt5}{7}$ .

We now use the given that $[KLMN] = 99$ , implying that $KL = LM = MN = NK = 3\sqrt{11}$ . We also draw the perpendicular from E to ML and label the point of intersection P.

This gives that $AM = 2 \cdot AN = 2 \cdot \frac{3\sqrt{11}}{\sqrt5}$ and $ME = \sqrt5 \cdot MP = \sqrt5 \cdot (ML - EG) = \sqrt5 \cdot (ML - (EC - (GF + FC))$

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2015 AIME I Problems/Problem 7

Problem

Solution