2016 AIME II Problem 8

Below is the professionally curated solution for Problem 8 of the 2016 AIME II, from LIVE by Po-Shen Loh. You can also try the full timed exam, view all 2016 AIME II solutions, or check the answer key.

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Concepts:prime factorizationmultiplication principle

Difficulty rating: 2710

8.

Find the number of sets {a,b,c}\{a, b, c\} of three distinct positive integers with the property that the product of a,a, b,b, and cc is equal to the product of 11,11, 21,21, 31,31, 41,41, 51,51, and 61.61.

Solution:

Count ordered triples (a,b,c)(a, b, c) with abc=112131415161=3271117314161=N.abc = 11 \cdot 21 \cdot 31 \cdot 41 \cdot 51 \cdot 61 = 3^2 \cdot 7 \cdot 11 \cdot 17 \cdot 31 \cdot 41 \cdot 61 = N. Each of the six primes 7,11,17,31,41,617, 11, 17, 31, 41, 61 appears once and can go to any of the three values: 363^6 ways. The two factors of 33 can be split among the three values in (42)=6\binom{4}{2} = 6 ways. That gives 636=43746 \cdot 3^6 = 4374 ordered triples.

If two of the three values were equal, their common value vv would satisfy v2N,v^2 \mid N, so v=1v = 1 or v=3.v = 3. This produces the triples with values {1,1,N}\{1, 1, N\} and {3,3,N9},\{3, 3, \frac{N}{9}\}, each in 33 orders, for 66 ordered triples in all (all three equal is impossible). The remaining 43746=43684374 - 6 = 4368 ordered triples have distinct entries, and each set {a,b,c}\{a, b, c\} is counted 3!=63! = 6 times.

So the number of sets is 43686=728.\frac{4368}{6} = 728.

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