2019 AMC 10A Problem 19
Problem 19 of 25HarderAlgebra
What is the least possible value of where is a real number?
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Solution
Multiplying the first two terms and the last terms yields
Note that these two terms differ by We can try to express this as a difference of squares, which is
Adding to this gets us
Squares are non-negative, so as long as we find a way to make the inner expression we can make the square
The discriminant is which is positive meaning that there is a value that makes the square
This means that the minimum value would be Thus, B is the correct answer.