Problems

A $3 \times 3$ square is partitioned into $9$ unit squares. Each unit square is painted either white or black with each color being equally likely, chosen independently and at random. The square is then rotated $90\,^{\circ}$ clockwise about its center, and every white square in a position formerly occupied by a black …

Adam, Benin, Chiang, Deshawn, Esther, and Fiona have internet accounts. Some, but not all, of them are internet friends with each other, and none of them has an internet friend outside this group. Each of them has the same number of internet friends. In how many different ways can this happen?

Let $a$ , $b$ , and $c$ be positive integers with $a\ge$ $b\ge$ $c$ such that \begin{align}a^2-b^2-c^2+ab&=2011\text{ and}\\ a^2+3b^2+3c^2-3ab-2ac-2bc&=-1997.\end{align} What is $a$ ?

Four distinct points are arranged on a plane so that the segments connecting them have lengths $a$ , $a$ , $a$ , $a$ , $2a$ , and $b$ . What is the ratio of $b$ to $a$ ?

Amy, Beth, and Jo listen to four different songs and discuss which ones they like. No song is liked by all three. Furthermore, for each of the three pairs of the girls, there is at least one song liked by those girls but disliked by the third. In how many different ways is this possible?

A bug travels from A to B along the segments in the hexagonal lattice pictured below. The segments marked with an arrow can be traveled only in the direction of the arrow, and the bug never travels the same segment more than once. How many different paths are there?

How many even integers are there between 200 and 700 whose digits are all different and come from the set {1, 2, 5, 7, 8, 9}?

Two counterfeit coins of equal weight are mixed with 8 identical genuine coins. The weight of each of the counterfeit coins is different from the weight of each of the genuine coins. A pair of coins is selected at random without replacement from the 10 coins. A second pair is selected at random without replacement from …

Each vertex of convex pentagon $ABCDE$ is to be assigned a color. There are $6$ colors to choose from, and the ends of each diagonal must have different colors. How many different colorings are possible?

Brian writes down four integers $w > x > y > z$ whose sum is $44$ . The pairwise positive differences of these numbers are $1, 3, 4, 5, 6,$ and $9$ . What is the sum of the possible values for $w$ ?

In a magical swamp there are two species of talking amphibians: toads, whose statements are always true, and frogs, whose statements are always false. Four amphibians, Brian, Chris, LeRoy, and Mike live together in this swamp, and they make the following statements. Brian: "Mike and I are different species." Chris: …

Bernardo randomly picks 3 distinct numbers from the set $\{1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9\}$ and arranges them in descending order to form a 3-digit number. Silvia randomly picks 3 distinct numbers from the set $\{1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8\}$ and also arranges them in descending order to form a 3-digit number. What is the probability that …

What is the sum of all the solutions of $x = \left|2x-|60-2x|\right|$ ?

Positive integers $a$ , $b$ , and $c$ are randomly and independently selected with replacement from the set $\{1, 2, 3,\dots, 2010\}$ . What is the probability that $abc + ab + a$ is divisible by $3$ ?

The entries in a $3 \times 3$ array include all the digits from $1$ through $9$ , arranged so that the entries in every row and column are in increasing order. How many such arrays are there?

Let $a$ , $b$ , $c$ , and $d$ be real numbers with $|a-b|=2$ , $|b-c|=3$ , and $|c-d|=4$ . What is the sum of all possible values of $|a-d|$ ?

For $k > 0$ , let $I_k = 10\ldots 064$ , where there are $k$ zeros between the $1$ and the $6$ . Let $N(k)$ be the number of factors of $2$ in the prime factorization of $I_k$ . What is the maximum value of $N(k)$ ?

Distinct points $A$ , $B$ , $C$ , and $D$ lie on a line, with $AB=BC=CD=1$ . Points $E$ and $F$ lie on a second line, parallel to the first, with $EF=1$ . A triangle with positive area has three of the six points as its vertices. How many possible values are there for the area of the triangle?

Each face of a cube is given a single narrow stripe painted from the center of one edge to the center of the opposite edge. The choice of the edge pairing is made at random and independently for each face. What is the probability that there is a continuous stripe encircling the cube?

Two fair coins are to be tossed once. For each head that results, one fair die is to be rolled. What is the probability that the sum of the die rolls is odd? (Note that if no die is rolled, the sum is $0$ .)

Three red beads, two white beads, and one blue bead are placed in line in random order. What is the probability that no two neighboring beads are the same color?

How many pairs of positive integers $(a,b)$ are there such that $a$ and $b$ have no common factors greater than $1$ and: $$\frac{a}{b} + \frac{14b}{9a}$$ is an integer?

A bug starts at one vertex of a cube and moves along the edges of the cube according to the following rule. At each vertex the bug will choose to travel along one of the three edges emanating from that vertex. Each edge has equal probability of being chosen, and all choices are independent. What is the probability that …

Team $A$ and team $B$ play a series. The first team to win three games wins the series. Each team is equally likely to win each game, there are no ties, and the outcomes of the individual games are independent. If team $B$ wins the second game and team $A$ wins the series, what is the probability that team $B$ wins the …

One fair die has faces $1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 3$ and another has faces $4, 4, 5, 5, 6, 6.$ The dice are rolled and the numbers on the top faces are added. What is the probability that the sum will be odd?