Puzzles
Equal lengths
The picture below shows two copies of the same rectangle with red and blue lines. The blue line visits the midpoint of the opposite side. The lengths shown in red and blue are of equal length.
What is the ratio of the sides of the rectangle?
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Let \(a\) be the height of the rectangle and \(b\) be the width.
The length of the red line is \(a+b\). The length of the blue line is \(2\sqrt{a^2+\frac{b^2}4}\). These are equal so:
\begin{align}
a+b&=2\sqrt{a^2+\frac{b^2}4}\\
(a+b)^2&=4\left(a^2+\frac{b^2}{4}\right)\\
a^2+2ab+b^2&=4a^2+b^2\\
0&=3a^2-2ab\\
0&=3a-2b\\
2b&=3a
\end{align}
Therefore the ratio of the sides is 2:3.
1 December
What is area of the largest area rectangle which will fit in a circle of radius 10?
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The largest rectangle will be a square. 20 (double the radius) will be the length of its diagonal.
By Pythagoras' Theorem, the sides of the square are \(10\sqrt{2}\). Therefore the area of the square is 200.
![](javascript:showlimage("rectangles506.png"))
