2007 AIME I Problems/Problem 13
Problem
A square pyramid with base and vertex
has eight edges of length 4. A plane passes through the midpoints of
,
, and
. The plane's intersection with the pyramid has an area that can be expressed as
. Find
.
Contents |
![]() This picture could be replaced by an asymptote drawing. It would be appreciated if you do this. |
Solution 1
Note first that the intersection is a pentagon.
Use 3D analytical geometry, setting the origin as the center of the square base and the pyramid’s points oriented as shown above. . Using the coordinates of the three points of intersection (
), it is possible to determine the equation of the plane. The equation of a plane resembles
, and using the points we find that
,
, and
. It is then
.
Write the equation of the lines and substitute to find that the other two points of intersection on ,
are
. To find the area of the pentagon, break it up into pieces (an isosceles triangle on the top, an isosceles trapezoid on the bottom). Using the distance formula (
), it is possible to find that the area of the triangle is
. The trapezoid has area
. In total, the area is
, and the solution is
.
Solution 2
Use the same coordinate system as above, and let the plane determined by intersect
at
and
at
. Then the line
is the intersection of the planes determined by
and
.
Note that the plane determined by has the equation
, and
can be described by
. It intersects the plane when
, or
. This intersection point has
. Similarly, the intersection between
and
has
. So
lies on the plane
, from which we obtain
and
. The area of the pentagon
can be computed in the same way as above.
See also
2007 AIME I (Problems • Answer Key • Resources) | ||
Preceded by Problem 12 |
Followed by Problem 14 | |
1 • 2 • 3 • 4 • 5 • 6 • 7 • 8 • 9 • 10 • 11 • 12 • 13 • 14 • 15 | ||
All AIME Problems and Solutions |