TR1313

TUTORIAL 5

1. 13 persons have first names Dennis, Evita and Ferdinand and last names Oh, Pietro,
Quine and Rostenkowski. Show that at least 2 persons have the same first and last names.

2. Is it possible to interconnect 5 processors so that exactly 2 processors are directly

connected to an identical number of processors? Explain.

3. Assume there are 3 men and 5 women at a party. Show that if these people are lined
up in a row, at least 2 women will be next to each other.

4. Find the minimum number of students needed to guarantee that 5 of them belong to
the same class (TK, TR, TC, TP).

5. A student must take 5 classes from 3 areas of study. Numerous classes are offered
in each discipline, but the student cannot take more than 2 classes in any given area. Using
the pigeonhole principle, show that the student will take at least 2 classes in 1 area.

6. There are 12 signs of the zodiac. How many people are needed to guarantee that at
least six of these people have the same sign?

7. How many people are needed to guarantee that at least two were born on the same
day of the week and in the same month (perhaps in different years?)

8. Prove that among any 100 integers there always two whose difference is divisible
by 99.

9. There are 8 different courses available for 155 students to take. Each student must
take at least two courses but not more than four from the offered 8 courses. Please show
that there must be two students who will take the same set of courses.
EXERCISES (from lecture notes)

1. Prove that among a group of six students, at least two received the same grades on
the final exam. (The grade assigned were chosen from A, B, C, D, F).

2. Suppose that each person in a group of 32 people receives a check in January. Prove
that at least two people receive checks on the same day.

3. Suppose that six distinct integers are selected from the set {1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10} .
Prove that at least two of the six have a sum equal to 11. Hint: Consider the partition
{1,10}, {2,9}, {3,8}, {4,7}, {5,6}.

4. Eighteen persons have first names Alfie, Ben and Cissi, and last names Dumont and
Elm. Show that at least three persons have the same first and last names.

5. Professor Euclid is paid every other week on Friday. Show that in some month she
is paid three times.

6. What is the minimum number of students required in a class to be sure that at least
6 will receive the same grade if there are five possible grades A, B,C, D and F?

7. Show that among any group of five (not necessarily consecutive) integers, there are
two with the same remainder when divided by 4.
8. A drawer contains a dozen brown socks and a dozen black socks, all unmatched. A
man takes socks out at random in the dark.
a) How many socks must he take out to be sure that he has at least two socks of the same
color?
b) How many socks must he take out to be sure that he has at least two black socks?

9. Find the minimum number n of integers to be selected from S={1,2,…,9} so that

(a) the sum of 2 of the n integers is even.
(b) the difference of 2 of the n integers is 5.