Nested Circles

Calculus Level 3

In the figure above, we have a large blue circle of radius 1.
In this circle, we draw 2 equal red circles that are tangent to each other and to the large circle.
In each of these smaller red circles, we draw 3 equal blue circles in the same fashion.
In each of these smaller blue circles, we draw 4 equal red circles, and so on.

Compute the area of the red region.


Source: Harvard- MIT Math Tournament.


The answer is 1.1557.

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1 solution

Hana Wehbi
Nov 19, 2016

If we continue drawing circles, we are going to obtain at the n t h n^{th} step n ! n! circles with radius 1 n ! \large\frac{1}{n!} each. Thus, the total area of n ! \large n! circles is : n ! × π ( n ! ) 2 = π n ! \large n! \times \frac{\pi}{(n!)^2}=\frac{\pi}{n!}

The desired area is obtained by adding the areas in step 2 2 , then subtracting those at step 3 3 , then adding the areas at step 4 4 and then subtracting those at step 5 5 and so forth.

To solve it : π 2 ! π 3 ! + π 4 ! . . . = π ( 1 0 ! 1 1 ! + 1 2 ! 1 3 ! ) + . . . = π × e 1 = π e \large\frac{\pi}{2!} - \frac{\pi}{3!} + \frac{\pi}{4!} - ...= \pi ( \frac{1}{0!} - \frac{1}{1!} + \frac{1}{2!} - \frac{1}{3!}) + ...= \pi\times e^{-1} = \frac{\pi}{e}

@Hana Nakkache O.k., I've got it now so I've deleted my report. The wording makes sense after the fact, and if it is good enough for Harvard then it's good enough for Brilliant, but for sake of clarity it might be worth considering "Compute the combined area of all the regions enclosed by a positive even number of circles" as the final sentence; that's how I finally made sense of it. Regardless, this was a fun question with an elegant result. :)

Brian Charlesworth - 4 years, 6 months ago

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@Brian Charlesworth Thank you.

Hana Wehbi - 4 years, 6 months ago

Great problem!

I almost missed the fact that the radius is 1! Thought it's 1 / 2 1/2 ! Teehee! Could have worked things out slowly. At least, I got the correct answer. ;)

Michael Huang - 4 years, 6 months ago

We've edited the problem for clarity, making it clear which regions are to be counted.

Can you reivew the problem for accuracy?

Calvin Lin Staff - 4 years, 6 months ago

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I think now it is clearer and I liked the new image.

Hana Wehbi - 4 years, 6 months ago

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