Diagonals of a Heptagon

Geometry Level 3

Let the length of the longest diagonal of a regular unit heptagon be a a and the length of the shortest diagonal be b b . Find the value of 100 ( a b ) 100(a-b) rounded to the nearest integer.

You may use a calculator that can perform standard trig functions ( sin \sin , cos \cos , and tan \tan ).


The answer is 45.

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1 solution

Josh Speckman
Aug 5, 2014

Let the heptagon be A B C D E F G ABCDEFG . Draw A C \overline{AC} and G D \overline{GD} . Now use Ptolemy's theorem on A C D G ACDG to obtain a b + 1 = b 2 b = a 2 + 4 + a 2 ab+1=b^2 \rightarrow b=\dfrac{\sqrt{a^2+4} + a}{2} Use Law of Cosines on Δ A B C \Delta ABC to obtain a 2 = 2 2 cos ( 900 7 ) a^2 = \sqrt{2-2\cos(\dfrac{900}{7})} . This can be calculated to approx. 1.80194 1.80194 . Now we plug this into our original equation to get b 2.24698 b \approx 2.24698 . Thus a b 0.44504 a-b \approx 0.44504 and 100 ( a b ) 44.504 100(a-b) \approx 44.504 rounds to 45 \boxed{45} .

First time I've seen Ptolemy's theorem being used in Brilliant. There really should be more problems using Ptolemy.

Omkar Kamat - 6 years, 5 months ago

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