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algebra intermediate

Problem

The product of two consecutive page numbers is What is the sum of the two page numbers?
Solution
Let the page numbers be and Then, the problem can be modeled by the equation We can rewrite the equation as

Now using the quadratic formula, we find that So, Hence,

This equation can be factored as well, but that would not save much time. The best way to solve this quickly would be to notice that falls between and so since we know that is an integer, we can guess that Plugging it back into the equation, we see that it works, so
Final answer
271