2017 Mathema cs Placement Test

(Feb. 14, 2017, Time: 90 min.)

⋆ For questions 1-11, write answers only. ⋆ ⟨ space for scratch ⟩

A. Basic (3 points for each, total 18 points)

x3 + x2 + x − 3
A-1. lim = .
x→1 x2 − 1

A-2. For the function f (x) = x3 + ax2 + 12x − 7 to be an

increasing function in (−∞, ∞), the range of a should
be given by .

sin(5x)
A-3. lim = .
x→0 2x

A-4. Consider the curve y = (x − 2) ln(x2 + x + 1) + cos x

and its tangent line at the point (0, 1). The slope of this
tangent line is .

{ ( ) ( )2 }
1∑
n
k k
A-5. lim 1−2 +3 = .
n→∞ n n n
k=1

A-6. In a coordinate space, consider a line, which is perpen-

dicular to the plane 2x−y+3z = 1 and which also passes
through the point (3, 1, 1) can be written as
x−3 y−1 z−1
= =
2 a b
In this case, we have a + b = .

B. Intermediate (7 points for each, total 49 points)

B-7. Consider the function f (x) = x sin x defined on the do-
main [0, π2 ]. The area enclosed by the graph of f (x) and
that of its inverse function is .

∫ 3
n
B-8. lim n e2x+1 cos(x3 ) dx = .
n→∞ 1
n

B-9. The positive solution of the equation x[x[x]] = 36 is

. (Here, [x] is the greatest integer which is not
bigger than x.)

B-10. Consider ten boxes in a row, which will be either painted

red or blue. The number of ways of painting boxes so
that any two consecutive boxes are not painted red is
.

B-11. Consider a tetrahedron ABCD in a 3-dimensional space,

whose lengths are given by AB = 4, BC = 7, CD = 11,
−→ −−→
DA = 9, AC = 10, BD = 10. Then we have AC · BD =
.

(1 of 2)
 ⋆ For questions 12-16, show all your works. ⋆ ⟨ space for scratch ⟩
B-12. In a coordinate plane, the graph of the function y =
ax3 + bx2 + cx + d (a > 0) intersects the line y = y1 at
three distinct points B, C, F labelled from the left, and
intersects the line y = y2 at three distinct points A, D, E
labelled from the left. Here we assume that y1 > y2 .
Orthogonally projecting the line segments AB, CD, EF
to x-axis, we obtain line segments each of whose lengths
are α, β, γ. If α + β + γ = 4, find the value of β.

B-13. For an arbitrary real number s > 1 and for any natural
number n ≥ 2, prove the following inequality
1 1 1 1
+ s + ··· + s <
2s 3 n s−1

C. Advanced (11 points for each, total 33 points)

√ √
√ 2018 √ 2017
C-14. Compare two numbers 2017 and 2018 . (De-
termine which number is larger.)

C-15. For a fixed rational number k, the functions

fn : [0, 1] → [0, 1] (n = 0, 1, 2, . . .)

are inductively defined as follows.

f0 (x) = kx − [kx],
fn (x) = fn−1 (1) + kx − [fn−1 (1) + kx] (n ≥ 1).

(Here, [x] is the greatest integer which is not bigger than

x.)
For any x0 ∈ [0, 1], Show that the number of elements
of the following set is finite

{f0 (x0 ), f1 (x0 ), f2 (x0 ), · · · }

C-16. In a coordinate space, consider the circle x2 + y 2 = 1,

z = 1 and a point P on it. Consider another circle
x2 + y 2 = 4, z = 0 and two points R, Q on this second
circle. Find the minimum of the following expression
2 2 2
P Q + P R − QR

(2 of 2)