Skip to main content

2006 AMC 12B Problem 18

Problem 18 of 25IntermediateGeometryNumber TheoryCounting & Probability

An object in the plane moves from one lattice point to another. At each step, the object may move one unit to the right, one unit to the left, one unit up, or one unit down. If the object starts at the origin and takes a ten-step path, how many different points could be the final point?

Answer choices

Show solution

Solution

Each step changes the coordinate sum by 1,1, so after 1010 steps the endpoint (a,b)(a, b) has a+ba + b even, and a+b10.|a| + |b| \le 10. Any such point is reachable: walk a+b|a| + |b| steps to it, then use the remaining even number of steps going out and back. The reachable points lie on the lines a+b=2ka + b = 2k for 5k5.-5 \le k \le 5. Each such line meets the diamond in exactly 1111 lattice points. With 1111 lines and 1111 points each, there are 121121 points. Thus, the correct answer is B.

More practice

Concepts: lattice point · parity · basic counting

Problem text and solution from the LIVE past-contest archive. See also the AoPS wiki page for community solutions.