All three circles above are tangent to each other and tangent to the horizontal line.
If the radius of the blue circle is and the radius of the green circle is , where ,
and the radius of the pink circle is and ,
where and are coprime positive integers, find .
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Using the diagram above:
l 2 = ( R 1 + x ) 2 − ( R 1 − x ) 2 = 4 R 1 x ⟹ l = 2 R 1 x
m 2 = ( R 2 + x ) 2 − ( R 2 − x ) 2 = 4 R 2 x ⟹ m = 2 R 2 x
p 2 = ( R 1 + R 2 ) 2 − ( R 1 − R 2 ) 2 ⟹ p = 2 R 1 R 2
p = l + m ⟹
R 1 R 2 = ( R 1 + R 2 ) x ⟹
x = ( R 1 + R 2 ) 2 R 1 R 2 = ( R 1 − R 2 ) 2 ⟹ R 1 R 2 = ( R 1 − R 2 ) 2 = R 1 2 − 2 R 2 R 1 + R 2 2
⟹ R 1 2 − 3 R 2 R 1 + R 2 2 = 0 ⟹ R 1 = ( 2 3 ± 5 ) R 2
R 1 > R 2 ∴ we drop R 1 = ( 2 3 − 5 ) R 2 ⟹
R 2 R 1 = 2 3 + 5 = c a + b ⟹ a + b + c = 1 0 .
Note: R 2 R 1 = 2 3 + 5 = 1 + ϕ = ϕ 2 , where ϕ is the golden ratio.