2013 AMC 10B Problems/Problem 16

Revision as of 23:15, 19 January 2020 by Lovemath21 (talk | contribs) (Solution 3)

Problem

In triangle $ABC$, medians $AD$ and $CE$ intersect at $P$, $PE=1.5$, $PD=2$, and $DE=2.5$. What is the area of $AEDC$?

$\qquad\textbf{(A) }13\qquad\textbf{(B) }13.5\qquad\textbf{(C) }14\qquad\textbf{(D) }14.5\qquad\textbf{(E) }15$ [asy] pair A,B,C,D,E,P; A=(0,0); B=(80,0); C=(20,40); D=(50,20); E=(40,0); P=(33.3,13.3); draw(A--B); draw(B--C); draw(A--C); draw(C--E); draw(A--D); draw(D--E); dot(A); dot(B); dot(C); dot(D); dot(E); dot(P); label("A",A,NNW); label("B",B,NNE); label("C",C,ENE); label("D",D,ESE); label("E",E,SSE); label("P",P,SSE); [/asy]


Solution 1

Let us use mass points: Assign $B$ mass $1$. Thus, because $E$ is the midpoint of $AB$, $A$ also has a mass of $1$. Similarly, $C$ has a mass of $1$. $D$ and $E$ each have a mass of $2$ because they are between $B$ and $C$ and $A$ and $B$ respectively. Note that the mass of $D$ is twice the mass of $A$, so AP must be twice as long as $PD$. PD has length $2$, so $AP$ has length $4$ and $AD$ has length $6$. Similarly, $CP$ is twice $PE$ and $PE=1.5$, so $CP=3$ and $CE=4.5$. Now note that triangle $PED$ is a $3-4-5$ right triangle with the right angle $DPE$. Since the diagonals of quadrilaterals $AEDC$, $AD$ and $CE$, are perpendicular, the area of $AEDC$ is $\frac{6 \times 4.5}{2}=\boxed{\textbf{(B)} 13.5}$

Solution 2

Note that triangle $DPE$ is a right triangle, and that the four angles (angles $APC, CPD, DPE,$ and $EPA$) that have point $P$ are all right angles. Using the fact that the centroid ($P$) divides each median in a $2:1$ ratio, $AP=4$ and $CP=3$. Quadrilateral $AEDC$ is now just four right triangles. The area is $\frac{4\cdot 1.5+4\cdot 3+3\cdot 2+2\cdot 1.5}{2}=\boxed{\textbf{(B)} 13.5}$

Solution 3

From the solution above, we can find that the lengths of the diagonals are $6$ and $4.5$. Now, since the diagonals of AEDC are perpendicular, we use the area formula to find that the total area is $\frac{6\times4.5}{2} = \frac{27}{2} = 13.5 = \boxed{\textbf{(B)} 13.5}$

Solution 4

From the solutions above, we know that the sides CP and AP are 3 and 4 respectively because of the properties of medians that divide cevians into 1:2 ratios. We can then proceed to use the heron's formula on the middle triangle EPD and get the area of EPD as 3/2, (its simple computation really, nothing large). Then we can find the areas of the remaining triangles based on side and ratio length of the bases.

See also

2013 AMC 10B (ProblemsAnswer KeyResources)
Preceded by
Problem 15
Followed by
Problem 17
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