Question

How many ways are there to place $3$ indistinguishable red chips, $3$ indistinguishable blue chips, and $3$ indistinguishable green chips in the squares of a $3 \times 3$ grid so that no two chips of the same color are directly adjacent to each other, either vertically or horizontally?

$12$

$18$

$24$

$30$

$36$

Answer: E

Concepts:arrangements with restrictions casework

Difficulty rating: 1820

Solution:

Choose the center color in $3$ ways. Its other two chips cannot occupy any edge-middle square, because those squares are adjacent to the center. Thus they must occupy two of the four corners, which can be chosen in $\binom42=6$ ways.

For either possible corner pattern—two opposite corners or two corners on the same side—the adjacency conditions force the remaining two colors up to interchanging them. Hence there are $2$ completions for each choice of the center color and its two corners. The total is $3\binom42\cdot2=36.$

Thus, E is the correct answer.

2021 AMC 10A Spring Problem 25

Answer: E

Difficulty rating: 1820

Solution:

Problem 25 in Other Years