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jmc

geometry senior

Problem

A square and a circle intersect so that each side of the square contains a chord of the circle equal in length to the radius of the circle. What is the ratio of the area of the square to the area of the circle? Express your answer as a common fraction in terms of .
Solution
Drawing a diagram and adding perpendicular to , we get First note that is not only the center of the circle but also the center of the square since the diagram is symmetric. Because the lengths of the sides of triangle are all the same, is equilateral. Thus, because is the height of the equilateral triangle, is the midpoint of . Thus, the length of segment is . Because is a 30-60-90 right triangle, . Because is perpendicular to and is the center of the square, is half the length of a side of the square. Thus, the square has side length of .

Calculating the areas of both of the shapes we get and . Thus, the ratio of the area of the square to the area of the circle is .
Final answer
\frac{3}{\pi}