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.
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Nice! I think you mean a/3 - b/3 = 1, not a/3 - b/1 = 1
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Of course. Thanks. Really nice problem BTW.
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 . The triangle's centroid would be at { 3 x , 3 1 } 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 3 1 : x 2 + 1 + x + 1 x = 3 1 ⟹ x → 3 4 . Using x = 3 4 in formula for the centroid gave location of the centroid as { 9 4 , 3 1 } . Noting that the y height is 3 1 as desired, I continued. The Euclidean distance between the incenter and the centroid is 9 4 − 3 1 ⟹ 9 1 . Now the scaling factor is known to be 9 . The perimeter of the original triangle, the sum of the three sides { 3 5 , 1 , 3 4 } is 4 . Therefore, the answer is 4 × 9 ⟶ 3 6 .
Let the right triangle be A B C , where ∠ C = 9 0 ∘ , ∠ A = θ , and A B = 1 . Then B C = sin θ and A C = cos θ . Let M be the midpoint of B C , I , the incenter, O , the centroid, A be the origin of x y -plane and O I be parallel to A C .
Then the y coordinate of I is given by
tan ∠ I A C tan 2 θ ⟹ y = x i y = cos θ − y y = 1 + tan 2 θ tan 2 θ cos θ where x i is the x coordinate of I . . . . ( 1 )
The y coordinate of O is given by y = 2 1 sin θ × 3 2 = 3 1 sin θ . . . ( 2 ) .
From ( 2 ) = ( 1 ) :
3 1 sin θ 3 1 tan θ 3 1 × 1 − t 2 2 t 3 ( 1 − t ) 2 ⟹ t = 1 + tan 2 θ tan 2 θ cos θ = 1 + tan 2 θ tan 2 θ = 1 + t t = 1 = tan 2 θ = 3 1 Let t = tan 2 θ
Therefore, tan θ = 1 − t 2 2 t = 1 − 9 1 3 2 = 4 3 ⟹ sin θ = 5 3 and cos θ = 5 4 . And
y x i x o = 1 + t t cos θ = 1 + 3 1 3 1 × 5 4 = 5 1 = cos θ − y = 5 4 − 5 1 = 5 3 = 3 2 cos θ = 3 2 × 5 4 = 1 5 8
Therefore O I = x i − x o = 1 5 1 . To make O I ′ = 1 , we multiply all linear dimensions by 15. Hence A B ′ = 1 × 1 5 = 1 5 , B C ′ = 1 5 sin θ = 9 , A C ′ = 1 5 cos θ = 1 2 , and the perimeter of △ A B C ′ is 3 6 .
It is worth noting that any triangle A B C with sides a = c + 3 , b = c + 6 and c > 3 is a triangle such that I G is parallel to B C and I G = 1 , where I is the incentre and G the centroid. The case c = 9 gives the right-angled triangle case asked for by the question, with B = 9 0 ∘ , giving a perimeter of 3 6 .
To prove this, suppose that A B C is a triangle with I G parallel to B C and I G = 1 Also suppose that b ≥ c . Also suppose that A = 9 0 ∘ . Then B C is not a diameter of the circumcircle of A B C . If we choose our origin O to be the circumcentre of the triangle A B C , so that O A . O B . O C all have the same length, then O B + O C is a nonzero vector perpendicular to B C , and so we require that I G ⋅ ( O B + O C ) = 0 Since O I = a + b + c 1 [ a O A + b O B + c O C ] O G = 3 1 [ O A + O B + O C ] the fact that I G is parallel to B C tells us (after much simplification) that 4 sin B sin C cos A ( 2 a − b − c ) = 0 and hence 2 a = b + c . But then I G = 3 ( b + c ) b − c B C and so we deduce that ( b − c ) a = 3 ( b + c ) . This leads us to a = c + 3 and b = c + 6 . We must have c > 3 for A B C to be nondegenerate.
It is also possible to show that we cannot have a nondegenerate triangle A B C with I G parallel to B C and A = 9 0 ∘ Using the notation of Ajit's solution, I G ⋅ ( a b ) = 6 1 ( a + b − a 2 + b 2 ) ( 2 a 2 + b 2 − a − b ) = 0 which shows that such a triangle is impossible.
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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Let the lengths of the legs be a and 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 and b .
a / 3 − b / 3 = 1 so a = b + 3
tan 2 θ = 2 b / 3 b / 3 = 2 1 from which tan θ = 3 4 = b a
Substituting gives b b + 3 = 3 4
From which b = 9 , a = 1 2 and by Pythagoras c = 1 5 . So the perimeter is a + b + c = 1 2 + 9 + 1 5 = 3 6