Let be a natural number $ n, $ a complex number $ a, $ and two matrices $ \left( a_{pq}\right)_{1\le q\le n}^{1\le p\le n} ,\left( b_{pq}\right)_{1\le q\le n}^{1\le p\le n}\in\mathcal{M}_n(\mathbb{C} ) $ such that $$ b_{pq} =a^{p-q}\cdot a_{pq},\quad\forall p,q\in\{ 1,2,\ldots ,n\} . $$ Calculate the determinant of $ B $ (in function of $ a $ and the determinant of $ A $ ).

Does there exist a real $3\times 3$ matrix $A$ such that $\text{tr}(A)=0$ and $A^2+A^t=I?$ ($\text{tr}(A)$ denotes the trace of $A,\ A^t$ the transpose of $A,$ and $I$ is the identity matrix.) [i]Proposed by Moubinool Omarjee, Paris[/i]

Le be a real number $ |a|<1, $ a natural number $ n\ge 2, $ and a $ 2\times 2 $ real matrix $ A $ that verifies $$ \det \left( A^{2n} -aA^{2n-1} -aA+I \right)=0. $$ Show that $ \det A=1. $

Prove that every polynomial of fourth degree can be represented in the form $P(Q(x))+R(S(x))$, where $P,Q,R,S$ are quadratic trinomials. [i]A. Golovanov[/i] [b]EDIT.[/b] It is confirmed that assuming the coefficients to be [b]real[/b], while solving the problem, earned a maximum score.

Let $A,B,C\in \mathcal{M}_n(\mathbb{R})$ such that $ABC=O_n$ and $\text{rank}\ B=1$. Prove that $AB=O_n$ or $BC=O_n$.

Let $a,b\in \mathbb{R}$ such that $b>a^2$. Find all the matrices $A\in \mathcal{M}_2(\mathbb{R})$ such that $\det(A^2-2aA+bI_2)=0$.

A matrix $A=(a_{ij})$ is called [i]nice[/i], if it has the following properties: (i) the set of all entries of $A$ is $\{1,2,\dots,2t\}$ for some integer $t$; (ii) the entries are non-decreasing in every row and in every column: $a_{i,j} \le a_{i,j+1}$ and $a_{i,j} \le a_{i+1,j}$; (iii) equal entries can appear only in the same row or the same column: if $a_{i,j}=a_{k,\ell}$, then either $i=k$ or $j=\ell$; (iv) for each $s=1,2,\dots,2t-1$, there exist $i \ne k$ and $j \ne \ell$ such that $a_{i,j}=s$ and $a_{k,\ell}=s+1$. Prove that for any positive integers $m$ and $n$, the number of nice $m \times n$ matrixes is even. For example, the only two nice $2 \times 3$ matrices are $\begin{pmatrix} 1 & 1 & 1\\2 & 2 & 2 \end{pmatrix}$ and $\begin{pmatrix} 1 & 1 & 3\\2 & 4 & 4 \end{pmatrix}$.

The Annual Interplanetary Mathematics Examination (AIME) is written by a committee of five Martians, five Venusians, and five Earthlings. At meetings, committee members sit at a round table with chairs numbered from $ 1$ to $ 15$ in clockwise order. Committee rules state that a Martian must occupy chair $ 1$ and an Earthling must occupy chair $ 15$. Furthermore, no Earthling can sit immediately to the left of a Martian, no Martian can sit immediately to the left of a Venusian, and no Venusian can sit immediately to the left of an Earthling. The number of possible seating arrangements for the committee is $ N\cdot (5!)^3$. Find $ N$.

Let $n \ge 2$ be an integer, and let $O$ be the $n \times n$ matrix whose entries are all equal to $0$. Two distinct entries of the matrix are chosen uniformly at random, and those two entries are changed from $0$ to $1$. Call the resulting matrix $A$. Determine the probability that $A^2 = O$, as a function of $n$.

Find the least $n\in N$ such that among any $n$ rays in space sharing a common origin there exist two which form an acute angle.

Let $n$ be a positive integer divisible by $4$. Find the number of permutations $\sigma$ of $(1,2,3,\cdots,n)$ which satisfy the condition $\sigma(j)+\sigma^{-1}(j)=n+1$ for all $j \in \{1,2,3,\cdots,n\}$.

The three row sums and the three column sums of the array \[\begin{bmatrix} 4 & 9 & 2 \\ 8 & 1 & 6 \\ 3 & 5 & 7 \end{bmatrix} \]are the same. What is the least number of entries that must be altered to make all six sums different from one another? $ \textbf{(A)}\ 1\qquad \textbf{(B)}\ 2\qquad \textbf{(C)}\ 3\qquad \textbf{(D)}\ 4\qquad \textbf{(E)}\ 5$

Let $A$, $B$ and $C$ be $n \times n$ matrices with complex entries satisfying $$A^2=B^2=C^2 \text{ and } B^3 = ABC + 2I.$$ Prove that $A^6=I$.

Let $a,b,c$ be distinct real numbers such that $a+b+c>0$. Let $M$ be the set of $3\times 3$ matrices with the property that each line and each column contain all given numbers $a,b,c$. Find $\{\max \{ \det A \mid A \in M \}$ and the number of matrices which realise the maximum value. [i]Mircea Becheanu[/i]

Let $n>1$ be an integer. A set $S \subset \{ 0,1,2, \ldots, 4n-1\}$ is called [i]rare[/i] if, for any $k\in\{0,1,\ldots,n-1\}$, the following two conditions take place at the same time (1) the set $S\cap \{4k-2,4k-1,4k, 4k+1, 4k+2 \}$ has at most two elements; (2) the set $S\cap \{4k+1,4k+2,4k+3\}$ has at most one element. Prove that the set $\{0,1,2,\ldots,4n-1\}$ has exactly $8 \cdot 7^{n-1}$ rare subsets.

Given two sequences $x_n$ and $y_n$ defined by $x_0 = y_0 = 7$, \[x_n = 4x_{n-1}+3y_{n-1}, \text{ and}\]\[y_n = 3y_{n-1}+2x_{n-1},\] find $\lim_{n \to \infty} \frac{x_n}{y_n}$.

Solve in $ \mathcal{M}_2(\mathbb{R}) $ the equation $ X^3+X+2I=0. $ [i]Florian Dumitrel[/i]

Let $n\geq 2$ be a positive integer, and $X$ a set with $n$ elements. Let $A_{1},A_{2},\ldots,A_{101}$ be subsets of $X$ such that the union of any $50$ of them has more than $\frac{50}{51}n$ elements. Prove that among these $101$ subsets there exist $3$ subsets such that any two of them have a common element.

Prove that if a vector space is the union of some of it's proper subspaces, then number of these subspaces can not be less than the number of elements of the field of that vector space.

We colour all the sides and diagonals of a regular polygon $P$ with $43$ vertices either red or blue in such a way that every vertex is an endpoint of $20$ red segments and $22$ blue segments. A triangle formed by vertices of $P$ is called monochromatic if all of its sides have the same colour. Suppose that there are $2022$ blue monochromatic triangles. How many red monochromatic triangles are there?

Two cubical dice each have removable numbers $ 1$ through $ 6$. The twelve numbers on the two dice are removed, put into a bag, then drawn one at a time and randomly reattached to the faces of the cubes, one number to each face. The dice are then rolled and the numbers on the two top faces are added. What is the probability that the sum is $ 7$? $ \textbf{(A)}\ \frac{1}{9} \qquad \textbf{(B)}\ \frac{1}{8} \qquad \textbf{(C)}\ \frac{1}{6} \qquad \textbf{(D)}\ \frac{2}{11} \qquad \textbf{(E)}\ \frac{1}{5}$

For $ t \equal{} 1, 2, 3, 4$, define $ \displaystyle S_t \equal{} \sum_{i \equal{} 1}^{350}a_i^t$, where $ a_i \in \{1,2,3,4\}$. If $ S_1 \equal{} 513$ and $ S_4 \equal{} 4745$, find the minimum possible value for $ S_2$.

Find the number of even permutations of $ \{1,2,\ldots,n\}$ with no fixed points.

Let $X$ be a invertible matrix with columns $X_{1},X_{2}...,X_{n}$. Let $Y$ be a matrix with columns $X_{2},X_{3},...,X_{n},0$. Show that the matrices $A=YX^{-1}$ and $B=X^{-1}Y$ have rank $n-1$ and have only $0$´s for eigenvalues.

Let be three elements $ a,b,c $ of a nontrivial, noncommutative ring, that satisfy $ ab=1-c, $ and such that there exists an element $ d $ from the ring such that $ a+cd $ is a unit. Prove that there exists an element $ e $ from the ring such that $ b+ec $ is a unit. [i]Andrei Nedelcu[/i] and [i] Lucian Ladunca [/i]