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II OBM

Brazil geometry

Problem

Given 5 points of a sphere of radius , show that two of the points are a distance less than or equal to apart.
Solution
Suppose the result is false so that we can find 5 points with the distance between any two greater than . Then the angle subtended by any two at the center of the sphere is greater than . Take one of the points to be at the north pole. Then the other four must all be south of the equator. Two must have longitude differing by at most .

It is now fairly obvious that these two points subtend an angle at most at the center. To prove it we may take rectangular coordinates with origin at the center of the sphere so that both points have all coordinates non-negative. Suppose one is and the other . Then since both lie on the sphere , and the square of the distance between them is , so the distance is at most , as required.

Techniques

3D ShapesPigeonhole principleCartesian coordinates