Berkeley Math Circle Monthly Contest 8 #0hw3

Berkeley Math Circle Monthly Contest 8Hard

From module Functional Equations (AIME Level)

Community difficultyNo ratings yetBe the first to rate this problem.

Understand the scale

Scale 0.5: Easiest math competition problems, often solvable even for early middle school students without experience. 1: Problems strictly for beginners, often at a moderate middle school level. 1.5: Problems for stronger beginner students, on the level of the middling problems in most middle school contests. 2: For motivated beginners, harder questions from the previous categories. 2.5: More advanced beginner problems, hardest questions from previous categories. 3: Early intermediate problems that require more creative thinking. 3.5: Tougher early intermediate problems that consistently stretch into higher-level creative thinking or conceptual knowledge. 4: Intermediate-level problems. 4.5: Upper intermediate problems approaching the upper bound for non-invitational sprint math competitions. 5: More difficult AIME problems or simple proof-based Olympiad-style problems. 6: High-level AIME-styled questions or introductory Olympiad-level questions. 7: Tougher Olympiad-level questions, may require more technical knowledge. 8: High-level Olympiad-level questions. 9: Expert Olympiad-level questions. 9.5: The hardest problems appearing on Olympiads which the strongest students could reasonably solve. 10: Historically notorious problems, generally unsuitable for even very hard competitions because they are exceedingly tedious, long, and difficult.

Functional EquationsRecurrence relations

Problem

Problem: Let $f: \mathbb{Z} \rightarrow \mathbb{Z}$ be a function such that $f(0)=2$ and for all integers $x$ ,

f(x+1)+f(x-1)=f(x) f(1) .

Prove that for all integers $x$ and $y$ ,

f(x+y)+f(x-y)=f(x) f(y) .

← Back to all problems