Incentroid

Geometry Level 4

The segment formed by joining the incenter and centroid of a certain right triangle is parallel to one of its legs and has a length of 1 unit.

Find the perimeter of this triangle.


The answer is 36.

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5 solutions

Jeremy Galvagni
Dec 6, 2018

Let the lengths of the legs be a a and b b as shown. The angle bisectors are the blue segments and meet at the incenter. The medians are the red segments and meet at the centroid. The projections of these points onto the legs are shown and distances are given in terms of a a and b b .

a / 3 b / 3 = 1 a/3 - b/3 =1 so a = b + 3 a=b+3

tan θ 2 = b / 3 2 b / 3 = 1 2 \tan \frac{\theta}{2}= \frac{b/3}{2b/3}=\frac{1}{2} from which tan θ = 4 3 = a b \tan \theta = \frac{4}{3} = \frac{a}{b}

Substituting gives b + 3 b = 4 3 \frac{b+3}{b}=\frac{4}{3}

From which b = 9 b=9 , a = 12 a=12 and by Pythagoras c = 15 c=15 . So the perimeter is a + b + c = 12 + 9 + 15 = 36 a+b+c=12+9+15=\boxed{36}

Nice! I think you mean a/3 - b/3 = 1, not a/3 - b/1 = 1

David Vreken - 2 years, 6 months ago

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Of course. Thanks. Really nice problem BTW.

Jeremy Galvagni - 2 years, 6 months ago

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Thank you!

David Vreken - 2 years, 6 months ago

Realizing that the length of the segment could be scaled by scaling the triangle, I assumed a height of the triangle with its right angle at the origin of 1 and a base of x x . The triangle's centroid would be at { x 3 , 1 3 } \left\{\frac{x}{3},\frac{1}{3}\right\} under those conditions. Using a description of the incenter computation , I derived a formula for the height of the centroid under those conditions and solved it for being equal to 1 3 \frac13 : x x 2 + 1 + x + 1 = 1 3 x 4 3 \frac{x}{\sqrt{x^2+1}+x+1}=\frac{1}{3} \Longrightarrow x\to \frac{4}{3} . Using x = 4 3 x=\frac43 in formula for the centroid gave location of the centroid as { 4 9 , 1 3 } \left\{\frac{4}{9},\frac{1}{3}\right\} . Noting that the y y height is 1 3 \frac13 as desired, I continued. The Euclidean distance between the incenter and the centroid is 4 9 1 3 1 9 \frac49-\frac13\Longrightarrow\frac19 . Now the scaling factor is known to be 9 9 . The perimeter of the original triangle, the sum of the three sides { 5 3 , 1 , 4 3 } \left\{\frac{5}{3},1,\frac{4}{3}\right\} is 4 4 . Therefore, the answer is 4 × 9 36 4\times 9\longrightarrow 36 .

Let the right triangle be A B C ABC , where C = 9 0 \angle C = 90^\circ , A = θ \angle A = \theta , and A B = 1 AB = 1 . Then B C = sin θ BC = \sin \theta and A C = cos θ AC=\cos \theta . Let M M be the midpoint of B C BC , I I , the incenter, O O , the centroid, A A be the origin of x y xy -plane and O I OI be parallel to A C AC .

Then the y y coordinate of I I is given by

tan I A C = y x i where x i is the x coordinate of I . tan θ 2 = y cos θ y y = tan θ 2 cos θ 1 + tan θ 2 . . . ( 1 ) \begin{aligned} \tan \angle IAC & = \frac y{\color{#3D99F6}x_i} & \small \color{#3D99F6} \text{where }x_i \text{ is the }x \text{ coordinate of }I. \\ \tan \frac \theta 2 & = \frac y{\cos \theta - y} \\ \implies y & = \frac {\tan \frac \theta 2 \cos \theta}{1+\tan \frac \theta 2} & ...(1) \end{aligned}

The y y coordinate of O O is given by y = 1 2 sin θ × 2 3 = 1 3 sin θ . . . ( 2 ) y = \dfrac 12 \sin \theta \times \dfrac 23 = \dfrac 13 \sin \theta \quad ...(2) .

From ( 2 ) = ( 1 ) (2)=(1) :

1 3 sin θ = tan θ 2 cos θ 1 + tan θ 2 1 3 tan θ = tan θ 2 1 + tan θ 2 Let t = tan θ 2 1 3 × 2 t 1 t 2 = t 1 + t 2 3 ( 1 t ) = 1 t = tan θ 2 = 1 3 \begin{aligned} \frac 13 \sin \theta & = \frac {\tan \frac \theta 2 \cos \theta}{1+\tan \frac \theta 2} \\ \frac 13 \tan \theta & = \frac {\tan \frac \theta 2}{1+\tan \frac \theta 2} & \small \color{#3D99F6} \text{Let }t = \tan \frac \theta 2 \\ \frac 13 \times \frac {2t}{1-t^2} & = \frac t{1+t} \\ \frac 2{3(1-t)} & = 1 \\ \implies t & = \tan \frac \theta 2 = \frac 13 \end{aligned}

Therefore, tan θ = 2 t 1 t 2 = 2 3 1 1 9 = 3 4 \tan \theta = \dfrac {2t}{1-t^2} = \dfrac {\frac 23}{1-\frac 19} = \dfrac 34 sin θ = 3 5 \implies \sin \theta = \dfrac 35 and cos θ = 4 5 \cos \theta = \dfrac 45 . And

y = t cos θ 1 + t = 1 3 × 4 5 1 + 1 3 = 1 5 x i = cos θ y = 4 5 1 5 = 3 5 x o = 2 3 cos θ = 2 3 × 4 5 = 8 15 \begin{aligned} y & = \frac {t \cos \theta}{1+t} = \frac {\frac 13 \times \frac 45}{1+\frac 13} = \frac 15 \\ x_i & = \cos \theta - y = \frac 45 - \frac 15 = \frac 35 \\ x_o & = \frac 23 \cos \theta = \frac 23 \times \frac 45 = \frac 8{15} \end{aligned}

Therefore O I = x i x o = 1 15 OI = x_i - x_o = \dfrac 1{15} . To make O I = 1 OI' = 1 , we multiply all linear dimensions by 15. Hence A B = 1 × 15 = 15 AB' = 1 \times 15 = 15 , B C = 15 sin θ = 9 BC' = 15\sin \theta = 9 , A C = 15 cos θ = 12 AC'=15\cos \theta = 12 , and the perimeter of A B C \triangle ABC' is 36 \boxed{36} .

Mark Hennings
Dec 6, 2018

It is worth noting that any triangle A B C ABC with sides a = c + 3 a = c+3 , b = c + 6 b = c+6 and c > 3 c > 3 is a triangle such that I G IG is parallel to B C BC and I G = 1 IG = 1 , where I I is the incentre and G G the centroid. The case c = 9 c=9 gives the right-angled triangle case asked for by the question, with B = 9 0 B = 90^\circ , giving a perimeter of 36 \boxed{36} .

To prove this, suppose that A B C ABC is a triangle with I G IG parallel to B C BC and I G = 1 IG = 1 Also suppose that b c b \ge c . Also suppose that A 9 0 A \neq 90^\circ . Then B C BC is not a diameter of the circumcircle of A B C ABC . If we choose our origin O O to be the circumcentre of the triangle A B C ABC , so that O A \overrightarrow{OA} . O B \overrightarrow{OB} . O C \overrightarrow{OC} all have the same length, then O B + O C \overrightarrow{OB} + \overrightarrow{OC} is a nonzero vector perpendicular to B C \overrightarrow{BC} , and so we require that I G ( O B + O C ) = 0 \overrightarrow{IG} \cdot \big(\overrightarrow{OB} + \overrightarrow{OC}\big) \; = \; 0 Since O I = 1 a + b + c [ a O A + b O B + c O C ] O G = 1 3 [ O A + O B + O C ] \overrightarrow{OI} \; = \; \frac{1}{a+b+c}\big[a\overrightarrow{OA} + b\overrightarrow{OB} + c\overrightarrow{OC} \big] \hspace{2cm} \overrightarrow{OG} \; = \; \tfrac13\big[\overrightarrow{OA} + \overrightarrow{OB} + \overrightarrow{OC}\big] the fact that I G IG is parallel to B C BC tells us (after much simplification) that 4 sin B sin C cos A ( 2 a b c ) = 0 4\sin B \sin C \cos A(2a - b - c) \; = \; 0 and hence 2 a = b + c 2a = b+c . But then I G = b c 3 ( b + c ) B C \overrightarrow{IG} \; = \; \frac{b-c}{3(b+c)}\overrightarrow{BC} and so we deduce that ( b c ) a = 3 ( b + c ) (b-c)a = 3(b+c) . This leads us to a = c + 3 a = c+3 and b = c + 6 b = c+6 . We must have c > 3 c > 3 for A B C ABC to be nondegenerate.

It is also possible to show that we cannot have a nondegenerate triangle A B C ABC with I G IG parallel to B C BC and A = 9 0 A = 90^\circ Using the notation of Ajit's solution, I G ( b a ) = 1 6 ( a + b a 2 + b 2 ) ( 2 a 2 + b 2 a b ) 0 \overrightarrow{IG} \cdot \binom{b}{a} \; = \; \tfrac16\big(a+b - \sqrt{a^2+b^2}\big)\big(2\sqrt{a^2+b^2} - a - b\big) \; \neq \; 0 which shows that such a triangle is impossible.

Ajit Athle
Dec 5, 2018

Consider the right triangle formed by (0,0), (a,0) & (0,b). The in-centre,I will be at (r,r) where r=(a+b-√(a²+b²))/2 and the centroid G will be at (a/3,b/3). However, since IG is parallel to one of the legs with a unit length we may say that a/3 =(r+1) and b/3 =r assuming a>b and thus r={3(r+1)+3r-√((3(r+1))²+(3r)²)}/2 which yields r=3, the only admissible root. So a=12 & b=9 while the perimeter, p=9+12+15=36.

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