2003 AIME II Problems/Problem 14
Contents
[hide]Problem
Let and
be points on the coordinate plane. Let
be a convex equilateral hexagon such that
and the y-coordinates of its vertices are distinct elements of the set
The area of the hexagon can be written in the form
where
and
are positive integers and n is not divisible by the square of any prime. Find
Solution
The y-coordinate of must be
. All other cases yield non-convex and/or degenerate hexagons, which violate the problem statement.
Letting , and knowing that
, we can use rewrite
using complex numbers:
. We solve for
and
and find that
and that
.
The area of the hexagon can then be found as the sum of the areas of two congruent triangles ( and
, with height
and base
) and a parallelogram (
, with height
and base
).
.
Thus, .
Solution 2
From this image, we can see that the y-coordinate of F is 4, and from this, we can gather that the coordinates of E, D, and C, respectively, are 8, 10, and 6.
Let the angle between the -axis and segment
be
, as shown above. Thus, as
, the angle between the
-axis and segment
is
, so
. Expanding, we have

Isolating we see that
, or
. Using the fact that
, we have
, or
. Letting the side length of the hexagon be
, we have
. After simplification we find that that
.
In particular, note that by the Pythagorean theorem, , hence
. Also, if
, then
, hence
and thus
. Using similar methods (or symmetry), we determine that
,
, and
. By the Shoelace theorem,
Hence the answer is .
See also
2003 AIME II (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 |
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