Olympiad problems

2014 France Team Selection Test, 1

Let $n$ be an positive integer. Find the smallest integer $k$ with the following property; Given any real numbers $a_1 , \cdots , a_d $ such that $a_1 + a_2 + \cdots + a_d = n$ and $0 \le a_i \le 1$ for $i=1,2,\cdots ,d$, it is possible to partition these numbers into $k$ groups (some of which may be empty) such that the sum of the numbers in each group is at most $1$.

1989 IMO Longlists, 68

Tags: combinatorics , partition , additive combinatorics , set systems

Prove that in the set $ \{1,2, \ldots, 1989\}$ can be expressed as the disjoint union of subsets $ A_i, \{i \equal{} 1,2, \ldots, 117\}$ such that [b]i.)[/b] each $ A_i$ contains 17 elements [b]ii.)[/b] the sum of all the elements in each $ A_i$ is the same.

2016 Belarus Team Selection Test, 3

Tags: combinatorics , additive combinatorics

Let $S$ be a nonempty set of positive integers. We say that a positive integer $n$ is [i]clean[/i] if it has a unique representation as a sum of an odd number of distinct elements from $S$. Prove that there exist infinitely many positive integers that are not clean.

2016 Peru IMO TST, 7

Tags: additive combinatorics , combinatorics

Let $S$ be a nonempty set of positive integers. We say that a positive integer $n$ is [i]clean[/i] if it has a unique representation as a sum of an odd number of distinct elements from $S$. Prove that there exist infinitely many positive integers that are not clean.

1992 IMO Longlists, 77

Tags: combinatorics , ramsey theory , additive number theory , additive combinatorics , extremal combinatorics

Show that if $994$ integers are chosen from $1, 2,\cdots , 1992$ and one of the chosen integers is less than $64$, then there exist two among the chosen integers such that one of them is a factor of the other.

2014 German National Olympiad, 3

Tags: coloring , sum , additive combinatorics , combinatorics

Given two positive integers $n$ and $k$, we say that $k$ is [i]$n$-ergetic[/i] if: However the elements of $M=\{1,2,\ldots, k\}$ are coloured in red and green, there exist $n$ not necessarily distinct integers of the same colour whose sum is again an element of $M$ of the same colour. For each positive integer $n$, determine the least $n$-ergetic integer, if it exists.

1983 IMO Longlists, 27

Tags: modular arithmetic , frobenius , additive number theory , additive combinatorics , number theory

Let $a,b$ and $c$ be positive integers, no two of which have a common divisor greater than $1$. Show that $2abc-ab-bc-ca$ is the largest integer which cannot be expressed in the form $xbc+yca+zab$, where $x,y,z$ are non-negative integers.

2014 Germany Team Selection Test, 1

Tags: algorithm , combinatorics , additive combinatorics

Let $n$ be an positive integer. Find the smallest integer $k$ with the following property; Given any real numbers $a_1 , \cdots , a_d $ such that $a_1 + a_2 + \cdots + a_d = n$ and $0 \le a_i \le 1$ for $i=1,2,\cdots ,d$, it is possible to partition these numbers into $k$ groups (some of which may be empty) such that the sum of the numbers in each group is at most $1$.

2014 India IMO Training Camp, 2

Tags: algorithm , combinatorics , additive combinatorics

Let $n$ be an positive integer. Find the smallest integer $k$ with the following property; Given any real numbers $a_1 , \cdots , a_d $ such that $a_1 + a_2 + \cdots + a_d = n$ and $0 \le a_i \le 1$ for $i=1,2,\cdots ,d$, it is possible to partition these numbers into $k$ groups (some of which may be empty) such that the sum of the numbers in each group is at most $1$.

2014 Taiwan TST Round 2, 2

Tags: function , combinatorics , additive combinatorics , sequence

Let $r$ be a positive integer, and let $a_0 , a_1 , \cdots $ be an infinite sequence of real numbers. Assume that for all nonnegative integers $m$ and $s$ there exists a positive integer $n \in [m+1, m+r]$ such that \[ a_m + a_{m+1} +\cdots +a_{m+s} = a_n + a_{n+1} +\cdots +a_{n+s} \] Prove that the sequence is periodic, i.e. there exists some $p \ge 1 $ such that $a_{n+p} =a_n $ for all $n \ge 0$.

2014 Taiwan TST Round 2, 5

Tags: induction , combinatorics , additive combinatorics , partition

Let $n$ be a positive integer, and let $A$ be a subset of $\{ 1,\cdots ,n\}$. An $A$-partition of $n$ into $k$ parts is a representation of n as a sum $n = a_1 + \cdots + a_k$, where the parts $a_1 , \cdots , a_k $ belong to $A$ and are not necessarily distinct. The number of different parts in such a partition is the number of (distinct) elements in the set $\{ a_1 , a_2 , \cdots , a_k \} $. We say that an $A$-partition of $n$ into $k$ parts is optimal if there is no $A$-partition of $n$ into $r$ parts with $r<k$. Prove that any optimal $A$-partition of $n$ contains at most $\sqrt[3]{6n}$ different parts.

2014 France Team Selection Test, 1

Tags: algorithm , combinatorics , additive combinatorics

Let $n$ be an positive integer. Find the smallest integer $k$ with the following property; Given any real numbers $a_1 , \cdots , a_d $ such that $a_1 + a_2 + \cdots + a_d = n$ and $0 \le a_i \le 1$ for $i=1,2,\cdots ,d$, it is possible to partition these numbers into $k$ groups (some of which may be empty) such that the sum of the numbers in each group is at most $1$.

1983 IMO Shortlist, 15

Tags: number theory , additive number theory , additive combinatorics

Decide whether there exists a set $M$ of positive integers satisfying the following conditions: (i) For any natural number $m>1$ there exist $a, b \in M$ such that $a+b = m.$ (ii) If $a, b, c, d \in M$, $a, b, c, d > 10$ and $a + b = c + d$, then $a = c$ or $a = d.$

2016 HMIC, 5

Tags: combinatorics , additive combinatorics , hmmt , arithmetic sequence , number theory

Let $S = \{a_1, \ldots, a_n \}$ be a finite set of positive integers of size $n \ge 1$, and let $T$ be the set of all positive integers that can be expressed as sums of perfect powers (including $1$) of distinct numbers in $S$, meaning \[ T = \left\{ \sum_{i=1}^n a_i^{e_i} \mid e_1, e_2, \dots, e_n \ge 0 \right\}. \] Show that there is a positive integer $N$ (only depending on $n$) such that $T$ contains no arithmetic progression of length $N$. [i]Yang Liu[/i]

2009 China Team Selection Test, 6

Tags: algebra , number theory , combinatorics , additive combinatorics

Determine whether there exists an arithimethical progression consisting of 40 terms and each of whose terms can be written in the form $ 2^m \plus{} 3^n$ or not. where $ m,n$ are nonnegative integers.

1992 IMO Longlists, 45

Tags: function , number theory , additive number theory , additive combinatorics , counting

Let $n$ be a positive integer. Prove that the number of ways to express $n$ as a sum of distinct positive integers (up to order) and the number of ways to express $n$ as a sum of odd positive integers (up to order) are the same.

1996 IMO Shortlist, 3

Tags: combinatorics , additive combinatorics , additive number theory , extremal combinatorics , subset

Let $ k,m,n$ be integers such that $ 1 < n \leq m \minus{} 1 \leq k.$ Determine the maximum size of a subset $ S$ of the set $ \{1,2,3, \ldots, k\minus{}1,k\}$ such that no $ n$ distinct elements of $ S$ add up to $ m.$

2012 Romanian Masters In Mathematics, 3

Tags: function , algebra , additive combinatorics , combinatorics

Each positive integer is coloured red or blue. A function $f$ from the set of positive integers to itself has the following two properties: (a) if $x\le y$, then $f(x)\le f(y)$; and (b) if $x,y$ and $z$ are (not necessarily distinct) positive integers of the same colour and $x+y=z$, then $f(x)+f(y)=f(z)$. Prove that there exists a positive number $a$ such that $f(x)\le ax$ for all positive integers $x$. [i](United Kingdom) Ben Elliott[/i]

2015 IMO Shortlist, C6

Tags: combinatorics , additive combinatorics

Let $S$ be a nonempty set of positive integers. We say that a positive integer $n$ is [i]clean[/i] if it has a unique representation as a sum of an odd number of distinct elements from $S$. Prove that there exist infinitely many positive integers that are not clean.

2013 IMO Shortlist, C4

Tags: induction , combinatorics , additive combinatorics , partition

Let $n$ be a positive integer, and let $A$ be a subset of $\{ 1,\cdots ,n\}$. An $A$-partition of $n$ into $k$ parts is a representation of n as a sum $n = a_1 + \cdots + a_k$, where the parts $a_1 , \cdots , a_k $ belong to $A$ and are not necessarily distinct. The number of different parts in such a partition is the number of (distinct) elements in the set $\{ a_1 , a_2 , \cdots , a_k \} $. We say that an $A$-partition of $n$ into $k$ parts is optimal if there is no $A$-partition of $n$ into $r$ parts with $r<k$. Prove that any optimal $A$-partition of $n$ contains at most $\sqrt[3]{6n}$ different parts.

1992 IMO Longlists, 64

Tags: algorithm , algebra , additive number theory , additive combinatorics

For any positive integer $n$ consider all representations $n = a_1 + \cdots+ a_k$, where $a_1 > a_2 > \cdots > a_k > 0$ are integers such that for all $i \in \{1, 2, \cdots , k - 1\}$, the number $a_i$ is divisible by $a_{i+1}$. Find the longest such representation of the number $1992.$

2017 Romanian Master of Mathematics, 1

Tags: algebra , additive combinatorics , representation

[b](a)[/b] Prove that every positive integer $n$ can be written uniquely in the form \[n=\sum_{j=1}^{2k+1}(-1)^{j-1}2^{m_j},\] where $k\geq 0$ and $0\le m_1<m_2\cdots <m_{2k+1}$ are integers. This number $k$ is called [i]weight[/i] of $n$. [b](b)[/b] Find (in closed form) the difference between the number of positive integers at most $2^{2017}$ with even weight and the number of positive integers at most $2^{2017}$ with odd weight.

2008 Germany Team Selection Test, 3

Tags: modular arithmetic , divisibility , extremal combinatorics , additive combinatorics , number theory

Let $ X$ be a set of 10,000 integers, none of them is divisible by 47. Prove that there exists a 2007-element subset $ Y$ of $ X$ such that $ a \minus{} b \plus{} c \minus{} d \plus{} e$ is not divisible by 47 for any $ a,b,c,d,e \in Y.$ [i]Author: Gerhard Wöginger, Netherlands[/i]

2014 Peru IMO TST, 16

Tags: induction , combinatorics , additive combinatorics , partition

Let $n$ be a positive integer, and let $A$ be a subset of $\{ 1,\cdots ,n\}$. An $A$-partition of $n$ into $k$ parts is a representation of n as a sum $n = a_1 + \cdots + a_k$, where the parts $a_1 , \cdots , a_k $ belong to $A$ and are not necessarily distinct. The number of different parts in such a partition is the number of (distinct) elements in the set $\{ a_1 , a_2 , \cdots , a_k \} $. We say that an $A$-partition of $n$ into $k$ parts is optimal if there is no $A$-partition of $n$ into $r$ parts with $r<k$. Prove that any optimal $A$-partition of $n$ contains at most $\sqrt[3]{6n}$ different parts.

2011 IMO Shortlist, 4

Tags: arithmetic sequence , combinatorics , additive combinatorics

Determine the greatest positive integer $k$ that satisfies the following property: The set of positive integers can be partitioned into $k$ subsets $A_1, A_2, \ldots, A_k$ such that for all integers $n \geq 15$ and all $i \in \{1, 2, \ldots, k\}$ there exist two distinct elements of $A_i$ whose sum is $n.$ [i]Proposed by Igor Voronovich, Belarus[/i]