Mathematical Olympiad Treasures aims at building a bridge between ordinary high school exercises and more sophisticated, intricate and abstract concepts in undergraduate mathematics. The book contains a stimulating collection of problems in the subjects of algebra, geometry, trigonometry, number theory and combinatorics. While it may be considered a sequel to "Mathematical Olympiad Challenges," the focus is on engaging a wider audience to apply techniques and strategies to real-world problems. Throughout the book students are encouraged to express their ideas, conjectures, and conclusions in writing. The goal is to help readers develop a host of new mathematical tools that will be useful beyond the classroom and in a number of disciplines.
* "Mathematical Olympiad Treasures" aims at building a bridge between ordinary high school exercises and more sophisticated, intricate and abstract concepts and problems in undergraduate mathematics. * The book contains a stimulating collection of problems in the subjects of algebra, geometry and trigonometry, number theory and combinatorics. * The problems are clustered by topic into self-contained sections, that begin with elementary facts, followed by a number of carefully selected problems and an extensive discussion of their solutions. * Should benefit undergraduate students, advanced high school students, instructors, and coaches. * "Treasures" is similar in structure to "Challenges", but with more emphasis on unconventional examples, essay answers, and creative thinking.
Mathematical Olympiad Challenges is a rich collection of problems put together by two experienced and well-known professors and coaches of the U.S. International Mathematical Olympiad Team. Hundreds of beautiful, challenging, and instructive problems from algebra, geometry, trigonometry, combinatorics, and number theory were selected from numerous mathematical competitions and journals. An important feature of the work is the comprehensive background material provided with each grouping of problems. The problems are clustered by topic into self-contained sections with solutions provided separately. All sections start with an essay discussing basic facts and one or two representative examples. A list of carefully chosen problems follows and the reader is invited to take them on. Additionally, historical insights and asides are presented to stimulate further inquiry. The emphasis throughout is on encouraging readers to move away from routine exercises and memorized algorithms toward creative solutions to open-ended problems. Aimed at motivated high school and beginning college students and instructors, this work can be used as a text for advanced problem- solving courses, for self-study, or as a resource for teachers and students training for mathematical competitions and for teacher professional development, seminars, and workshops.
This is a challenging problem-solving book in Euclidean geometry, assuming nothing of the reader other than a good deal of courage. Topics covered included cyclic quadrilaterals, power of a point, homothety, triangle centers; along the way the reader will meet such classical gems as the nine-point circle, the Simson line, the symmedian and the mixtilinear incircle, as well as the theorems of Euler, Ceva, Menelaus, and Pascal. Another part is dedicated to the use of complex numbers and barycentric coordinates, granting the reader both a traditional and computational viewpoint of the material. The final part consists of some more advanced topics, such as inversion in the plane, the cross ratio and projective transformations, and the theory of the complete quadrilateral. The exposition is friendly and relaxed, and accompanied by over 300 beautifully drawn figures. The emphasis of this book is placed squarely on the problems. Each chapter contains carefully chosen worked examples, which explain not only the solutions to the problems but also describe in close detail how one would invent the solution to begin with. The text contains a selection of 300 practice problems of varying difficulty from contests around the world, with extensive hints and selected solutions. This book is especially suitable for students preparing for national or international mathematical olympiads or for teachers looking for a text for an honor class.
This book is intended for the Mathematical Olympiad students who wish to prepare for the study of inequalities, a topic now of frequent use at various levels of mathematical competitions. In this volume we present both classic inequalities and the more useful inequalities for confronting and solving optimization problems. An important part of this book deals with geometric inequalities and this fact makes a big difference with respect to most of the books that deal with this topic in the mathematical olympiad. The book has been organized in four chapters which have each of them a different character. Chapter 1 is dedicated to present basic inequalities. Most of them are numerical inequalities generally lacking any geometric meaning. However, where it is possible to provide a geometric interpretation, we include it as we go along. We emphasize the importance of some of these inequalities, such as the inequality between the arithmetic mean and the geometric mean, the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality, the rearrangementinequality, the Jensen inequality, the Muirhead theorem, among others. For all these, besides giving the proof, we present several examples that show how to use them in mathematical olympiad problems. We also emphasize how the substitution strategy is used to deduce several inequalities.
* Problem-solving tactics and practical test-taking techniques provide in-depth enrichment and preparation for various math competitions * Comprehensive introduction to trigonometric functions, their relations and functional properties, and their applications in the Euclidean plane and solid geometry * A cogent problem-solving resource for advanced high school students, undergraduates, and mathematics teachers engaged in competition training
Over 300 unusual problems, ranging from easy to difficult, involving equations and inequalities, Diophantine equations, number theory, quadratic equations, logarithms, more. Detailed solutions, as well as brief answers, for all problems are provided.
This book takes the reader on a journey through the world of college mathematics, focusing on some of the most important concepts and results in the theories of polynomials, linear algebra, real analysis, differential equations, coordinate geometry, trigonometry, elementary number theory, combinatorics, and probability. Preliminary material provides an overview of common methods of proof: argument by contradiction, mathematical induction, pigeonhole principle, ordered sets, and invariants. Each chapter systematically presents a single subject within which problems are clustered in each section according to the specific topic. The exposition is driven by nearly 1300 problems and examples chosen from numerous sources from around the world; many original contributions come from the authors. The source, author, and historical background are cited whenever possible. Complete solutions to all problems are given at the end of the book. This second edition includes new sections on quad ratic polynomials, curves in the plane, quadratic fields, combinatorics of numbers, and graph theory, and added problems or theoretical expansion of sections on polynomials, matrices, abstract algebra, limits of sequences and functions, derivatives and their applications, Stokes' theorem, analytical geometry, combinatorial geometry, and counting strategies. Using the W.L. Putnam Mathematical Competition for undergraduates as an inspiring symbol to build an appropriate math background for graduate studies in pure or applied mathematics, the reader is eased into transitioning from problem-solving at the high school level to the university and beyond, that is, to mathematical research. This work may be used as a study guide for the Putnam exam, as a text for many different problem-solving courses, and as a source of problems for standard courses in undergraduate mathematics. Putnam and Beyond is organized for independent study by undergraduate and gradu ate students, as well as teachers and researchers in the physical sciences who wish to expand their mathematical horizons.
