2017 AIME II Problem 14

Below is the professionally curated solution for Problem 14 of the 2017 AIME II, from LIVE by Po-Shen Loh. You can also try the full timed exam, view all 2017 AIME II solutions, or check the answer key.

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Concepts:lattice point3D geometrycaseworksymmetry

Difficulty rating: 3370

14.

A 10×10×1010 \times 10 \times 10 grid of points consists of all points in space of the form (i,j,k),(i, j, k), where i,i, j,j, and kk are integers between 11 and 10,10, inclusive. Find the number of different lines that contain exactly 88 of these points.

Solution:

Take a primitive direction vector (a,b,c)(a, b, c) for the line. Any nonzero component of absolute value 22 or more limits the line to at most 55 grid points, so every component is 00 or ±1.\pm 1. Lines parallel to a coordinate axis contain 1010 points, never 8.8. If exactly one component is 0,0, the line lies in one of the 3030 planes parallel to a face of the cube (33 orientations, 1010 positions), and within that 10×1010 \times 10 grid it is a diagonal of slope ±1\pm 1 shifted off center; the shift by 22 in either direction from each of the two main diagonals gives exactly 88 points. That is 44 lines per plane, and each lies in only one of the 3030 planes: 430=1204 \cdot 30 = 120 lines.

Otherwise the direction is one of the four space-diagonal directions (1,±1,±1)(1, \pm 1, \pm 1) up to sign; by symmetry, count lines parallel to (1,1,1)(1, 1, 1) and multiply by 4.4. Such a line (d+t, e+t, f+t)(d + t,\ e + t,\ f + t) meets the grid in 10(max(d,e,f)min(d,e,f))10 - (\max(d,e,f) - \min(d,e,f)) points, so exactly 88 points means maxmin=2.\max - \min = 2. Normalizing the base point so that min(d,e,f)=1,\min(d, e, f) = 1, we need (d,e,f)(d, e, f) with entries in {1,2,3}\{1, 2, 3\} using both 11 and 3:3: there are 2788+1=1227 - 8 - 8 + 1 = 12 of them, hence 1212 lines per direction and 412=484 \cdot 12 = 48 in all.

The total is 120+48=168.120 + 48 = 168.

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