2015 AMC 10A Problems/Problem 10
Problem
How many rearrangements of are there in which no two adjacent letters are also adjacent letters in the alphabet? For example, no such rearrangements could include either
or
.
$\textbf{(A)}\ 0\qquad\textbf{(B)}\ 1\qquad\textbf{(C)}\ 2\qquad\textbf{(D)}}\ 3\qquad\textbf{(E)}\ 4$ (Error compiling LaTeX. Unknown error_msg)
Solution
Observe that we can't begin a rearrangement with either a or d, leaving bcd and abc, respectively.
Starting with b, there is only one rearrangement: . Similarly, there is only one rearrangement when we start with c:
.
Therefore, our answer must be .