2019 AIME II Problems/Problem 5
Problem
Four ambassadors and one advisor for each of them are to be seated at a round table with chairs numbered in order
to
. Each ambassador must sit in an even-numbered chair. Each advisor must sit in a chair adjacent to his or her ambassador. There are
ways for the
people to be seated at the table under these conditions. Find the remainder when
is divided by
.
Solution 1
Let us first consider the ambassadors and the
even-numbered chairs. If we consider only their relative positions, they can sit in one of
distinct ways: Such that the
empty even-numbered chairs are adjacent, such that they are separated by one occupied even-numbered chair, and such that they are opposite each other. For each way, there are
ways to assign the
ambassadors to the
selected seats.
In the first way, there are distinct orientations. The
advisors can be placed in any of the
odd-numbered chairs adjacent to the ambassadors, and for each placement, there is exactly one way to assign them to the ambassadors. This means that there are
total seating arrangements for this way.
In the second way, there are distinct orientations.
advisors can be placed in any of the
chairs adjacent to the "chunk" of
ambassadors, and
advisor can be placed in either of the
chairs adjacent to the "lonely" ambassador. Once again, for each placement, there is exactly one way to assign the advisors to the ambassadors. This means that there are
total seating arrangements for this way.
In the third way, there are distinct orientations. For both "chunks" of
ambassadors,
advisors can be placed in any of the
chairs adjacent to them, and once again, there is exactly one way to assign them for each placement. This means that there are
total seating arrangements for this way.
Totalling up the arrangements, there are total ways to seat the people, and the remainer when
is divided by
is
. ~emerald_block
Solution 2
In the diagram, the seats are numbered 1...12. Rather than picking seats for each person, however, each ambassador/assistant team picks a gap between the seats (A...L) and the ambassador sits in the even seat while the assistant sits in the odd seat. For example, if team 1 picks gap C then Ambassador 1 will sit in seat 2 while assistant 1 will sit in seat 3. No two teams can pick adjacent gaps. For example, if team 1 chooses gap C then team 2 cannot pick gaps B or D. In the diagram, the teams have picked gaps C, F, H and J. Note that the gap-gaps - distances between the chosen gaps - (in the diagram, 2, 1, 1, 4) must sum to 8. So, to get the number of seatings, we:
- Choose a gap for team 1 (
options)
- Choose 3 other gaps around the table with positive gap-gaps. The number of ways to do this is the number of ways to partition 8 with 4 positive integers. This is the same as partitioning 4 with 4 non-negative integers, and using stars-and-bars, this is
- Place the other 3 teams in the chosen gaps (
permutations)
So the total is
And the remainder is
Solution 3
There are total ways to let everyone sit. However this may lead to advisors sitting in the same chair, leading to awkward situations. So we find how many ways this happens. There are 6 ways to choose which advisors end up sitting together, times 12 ways to find neighboring even seats and sitting down, 12 ways for the rest of the ambassador to sit, and 4 ways for their advisors to sit to get 3456 ways for this to happen. However we overcounted the case when two pairs of advisors run out of room to sit, where there are
ways to happen. So 5760-3456+216=
.
Solution 4
We see that for every 2 adjacent spots on the table, there is exactly one way for an ambassador and his or her partner to sit. There are 2 cases:
- There is an ambassador at the 12th chair and his or her partner at the 1st chair
- There is no pair that has their chairs numbered as 12 and 1
For the first case, there are ways to arrange the pairs.
For the second case, there are ways to arrange the pairs.
Finally, we have to assign ambassadors and their advisors to the pairs, which has 24 ways, so , or
~PenguinMoosey
See Also
2019 AIME II (Problems • Answer Key • Resources) | ||
Preceded by Problem 4 |
Followed by Problem 6 | |
1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • 10 • 11 • 12 • 13 • 14 • 15 | ||
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