Blue or Yellow

Geometry Level 3

The figure shows a yellow equilateral triangle, D E F DEF , inscribed inside a larger equilateral triangle, A B C ABC .

A D = D B 4 AD = \dfrac{DB}{4} . Which is the larger area, blue or yellow?

Blue Yellow They are both equal

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2 solutions

Chew-Seong Cheong
May 23, 2021

Let the side length of the larger equilateral triangle be 1 1 . Then A D = 1 5 AD = \frac 15 and D B = 4 5 DB = \frac 45 . By cosine rule ,

D E 2 = E B 2 + D B 2 2 E B D B cos B Note that E B = A D = 1 5 D E 2 = 1 25 + 16 25 2 1 5 4 5 cos 6 0 = 17 25 4 25 = 13 25 \begin{aligned} DE^2 & = \blue{EB}^2 + DB^2 - 2 \cdot \blue{EB} \cdot DB \cdot \cos B & \small \blue{\text{Note that }EB=AD = \frac 15} \\ DE^2 & = \frac 1{25} + \frac {16}{25} - 2 \cdot \frac 15 \cdot \frac 45 \cdot \cos 60^\circ \\ & = \frac {17}{25} - \frac 4{25} = \frac {13}{25} \end{aligned}

Since the area of an equilateral triangle is directly proportional to the square of its side length, the area of the yellow equilateral triangle is 13 25 \frac {13}{25} that of the large equilateral triangle. This means the blue area is 12 25 \frac {12}{25} that of the large equilateral triangle. Hence yellow area is larger than the blue area.

Saya Suka
May 22, 2021

Letting AD be 1 and DB be 4, the perpendicular distance of point F to the line AB is 2√3. We can easily get FD with √(FG² + GD²) = √( (2√3)² + (2 – 1)² ) = √13 . Compared with the original triangle with sides of 4 + 1 = 5, the ratio is ori : yellow = 5² : √13² = 25 : 13 and the blue : yellow should be 25 – 13 : 13 = 12 : 13

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