IMO Math

Let $n$ be a positive integer. Define a chameleon to be any sequence of $3n$ letters, with exactly $n$ occurrences of each of the letters $a, b,$ and $c$. Define a swap to be the transposition of two adjacent letters in a chameleon. Prove that for any chameleon $X$ , there exists a chameleon $Y$ such that $X$ cannot be changed to $Y$ using fewer than $3n^2/2$ swaps.

 In an acute-angled triangle $ABC$ on the sides $AB$, $BC$, $AC$ the points $H$, $L$, $K$ so that $CH \perp AB$, $HL \parallel AC$, $HK \parallel BC$. Let $P$ and $Q$ feet of altitudes of a triangle $HBL$, drawn from the vertices $H$ and $B$ respectively. Prove that the feet of the altitudes of the triangle $AKH$, drawn from the vertices $A$ and $H$ lie on the line $PQ$.

 Hi,  I'm sorry but I won't be able to stream today.  I have a little pain in neck and it hurts a bit when I talk. I will stream again next week (Friday, April 15th) at 7:00 PM

Now, we are officially spread all throughout the world! We have views from every continent (well other than Antarctica, of course).  We already had it spread in all continents other than Africa but now we have many views from Africa as well. Before, it was technically "spread" in Africa, but there were minimal views from there.  I'm really happy about this :) Thank you so much to everyone who views my blog :D I hope it continues to help you.

Hi,  I have decided that sometimes, I will pick problems that are not from the IMO shortlists but I believe that it is an IMO-level problem (in other words, I think that the problem could have appeared in the IMO as well). Because after all, there are a limited number of problems.  

 A permutation $ \{x_1, x_2, \ldots, x_{2n}\}$ of the set $ \{1,2, \ldots, 2n\}$ where $ n$ is a positive integer, is said to have property $ T$ if $ |x_i - x_{i + 1}| = n$ for at least one $ i$ in $ \{1,2, \ldots, 2n - 1\}.$ Show that, for each $ n$, there are more permutations with property $ T$ than without.

  Find all triplets of positive integers $ (a,m,n)$ such that $ a^m + 1 \mid (a + 1)^n$.

Let $\mathcal{A}$ denote the set of all polynomials in three variables $x, y, z$ with integer coefficients. Let $\mathcal{B}$ denote the subset of $\mathcal{A}$ formed by all polynomials which can be expressed as \begin{align*} (x + y + z)P(x, y, z) + (xy + yz + zx)Q(x, y, z) + xyzR(x, y, z) \end{align*}with $P, Q, R \in \mathcal{A}$. Find the smallest non-negative integer $n$ such that $x^i y^j z^k \in \mathcal{B}$ for all non-negative integers $i, j, k$ satisfying $i + j + k \geq n$.

In  this  post, Anonymous suggested that I should start a Twitch stream. Thanks for the suggestion! I will stream every Friday at 7:00 PM EST, starting March 25th. You can find my Twitch account here .  You can submit problems that you want me to solve during the stream at my email, imomath@imomath.xyz, or at my discord handle, math4l#4750.  If I get no problem requests, then I will pick a random problem to solve and explain. 

Today (March 18th) is my birthday! I was born on March 18th, 2009.  Thanks to my parents for supporting me in my journey so much :) I probably would've given up a long time back if it wasn't for them.  Now it's time for 2009 IMO SL #18, which is 2009 IMO SL #G3.  Let $ABC$ be a triangle. The incircle of $ABC$ touches the sides $AB$ and $AC$ at the points $Z$ and $Y$, respectively. Let $G$ be the point where the lines $BY$ and $CZ$ meet, and let $R$ and $S$ be points such that the two quadrilaterals $BCYR$ and $BCSZ$ are parallelogram. Prove that $GR=GS$. Let the incircle touch $\overline{BC}$ at $X$ and let the $A$-excircle $\omega_A$ touch $\overline{BC}$ at $X'$ and $\overline{AC}$ at $Y'$. Denote $\omega_R$ and $\omega_S$ as the circles centered at $R$ and $S$ respectively, both with radius $0$. Notice that $BR=CY=CX=BX'$ and $YR=BC=AY'-AY=YY'$, so we have that $\overline{BY}$ is the radical axis of $\omega_A$ and $\omega_R$. Similarly, $\overline{CZ}

We consider two sequences of real numbers $x_{1} \geq x_{2} \geq \ldots \geq x_{n}$ and $\ y_{1} \geq y_{2} \geq \ldots \geq y_{n}.$ Let $z_{1}, z_{2}, .\ldots, z_{n}$ be a permutation of the numbers $y_{1}, y_{2}, \ldots, y_{n}.$ Prove that $\sum \limits_{i=1}^{n} ( x_{i} -\ y_{i} )^{2} \leq \sum \limits_{i=1}^{n}$ $( x_{i} - z_{i})^{2}.$

I got several emails about how I haven't posted in a week, while I usually post during the first few days of the week. So don't worry, I'm still alive :D  Now let's get to the math.

Suppose that $ a_1$, $ a_2$, $ \ldots$, $ a_n$ are integers such that $ n\mid a_1 + a_2 + \ldots + a_n$. Prove that there exist two permutations $ \left(b_1,b_2,\ldots,b_n\right)$ and $ \left(c_1,c_2,\ldots,c_n\right)$ of $ \left(1,2,\ldots,n\right)$ such that for each integer $ i$ with $ 1\leq i\leq n$, we have \[ n\mid a_i - b_i - c_i \]

Let $ a$, $ b$, $ c$, $ d$ be positive real numbers such that $ abcd = 1$ and $ a + b + c + d > \dfrac{a}{b} + \dfrac{b}{c} + \dfrac{c}{d} + \dfrac{d}{a}$. Prove that \[ a + b + c + d < \dfrac{b}{a} + \dfrac{c}{b} + \dfrac{d}{c} + \dfrac{a}{d}\]

Let $S$ be a convex quadrilateral $ABCD$ and $O$ a point inside it. The feet of the perpendiculars from $O$ to $AB, BC, CD, DA$ are $A_1, B_1, C_1, D_1$ respectively. The feet of the perpendiculars from $O$ to the sides of $S_i$, the quadrilateral $A_iB_iC_iD_i$, are $A_{i+1}B_{i+1}C_{i+1}D_{i+1}$, where $i = 1, 2, 3.$ Prove that $S_4$ is similar to S.