A certain panel is to be composed of exactly three women and exactly two men, chosen from x women and y men. How many different panels can be formed with these constraints?
(1) If two more women were available for selection, exactly 56 different groups of three women could be selected.
(2) x = y + 1
x women and y men
This topic has expert replies
-
- Legendary Member
- Posts: 510
- Joined: Thu Aug 07, 2014 2:24 am
- Thanked: 3 times
- Followed by:5 members
- sanju09
- GMAT Instructor
- Posts: 3650
- Joined: Wed Jan 21, 2009 4:27 am
- Location: India
- Thanked: 267 times
- Followed by:80 members
- GMAT Score:760
In order to answer the number of different panels, we'll choose 3 of x women and 2 of y men. To get to those numbers, we need the separate values of x and y for sure. Let's inspect the statements one by one:j_shreyans wrote:A certain panel is to be composed of exactly three women and exactly two men, chosen from x women and y men. How many different panels can be formed with these constraints?
(1) If two more women were available for selection, exactly 56 different groups of three women could be selected.
(2) x = y + 1
(1) If two more women were available for selection, then 3 of (x + 2) women can be chosen in exactly [(x + 2) (x + 1) x]/[(3)(2)(1)] = 56 different ways, and since x is a positive integer, number of women can be answered uniquely with no clue about the number of men, or y. Hence, insufficient. Go for BCE
(2) This means that number of women is 1 more than the number of men. No starting number! Hence, insufficient. Go for CE now.
Taken together, we know [spoiler]both x and y; hence SUFFICIENT.
Take C[/spoiler]
The mind is everything. What you think you become. -Lord Buddha
Sanjeev K Saxena
Quantitative Instructor
The Princeton Review - Manya Abroad
Lucknow-226001
www.manyagroup.com
Sanjeev K Saxena
Quantitative Instructor
The Princeton Review - Manya Abroad
Lucknow-226001
www.manyagroup.com
GMAT/MBA Expert
- Brent@GMATPrepNow
- GMAT Instructor
- Posts: 16207
- Joined: Mon Dec 08, 2008 6:26 pm
- Location: Vancouver, BC
- Thanked: 5254 times
- Followed by:1268 members
- GMAT Score:770
Target question: How many different panels can be formed with these constraints?A certain panel is to be composed of exactly three women and exactly two men, chosen from x women and y men. How many different panels can be formed with these constraints?
(1) If two more women were available for selection, exactly 56 different groups of three women could be selected.
(2) x = y + 1
First recognize that, since the order of the selected people does not matter, we can use combinations to solve this. We can select 3 women from x women in xC3 ways, and we can select 2 men from y men in yC2 ways. So, the total number of possible panels = (xC3)(yC2)
As you can see,the answer to the target question will depend solely on the individual values of x and y.
Statement 1: If two more women were available for selection, exactly 56 different groups of three women could be selected.
Since there's no information about the number of men, statement 1 is NOT SUFFICIENT
Statement 2: x = y + 1
There are several pairs that meet this condition. Here are two:
Case a: x = 3 and y = 2, in which case there's only 1 possible panel (since we'd have no choice but to select all 5 people)
Case b: x = 201 and y = 200, in which case there are TONS of possible panels
Since we cannot answer the target question with certainty, statement 2 is NOT SUFFICIENT
Statements 1 and 2 combined
Statement 1 basically tells us that (x+2)C3 = 56 ["x+2 CHOOSE 3 equals 56"]
Do we need to solve for x? NO. We need only recognize that we COULD solve for x.
Let's start checking a few possible values.
3C3 = 1
4C3 = 4
5C3 = 10
6C3 = 20
Aside: if anyone is interested, we have a free video on calculating combinations (like 6C3) in your head: https://www.gmatprepnow.com/module/gmat-counting?id=789
We can see that the numbers keep increasing, so there will be ONLY ONE value of x such that (x+2)C3 = 56 [incidentally, 8C3 = 56. So, (x+2) = 8, which means x = 6. Of course, that doesn't really matter since we need only recognize that we COULD determine the value of x]
So, from statement 1, we COULD determine the value of x
Once we know the value of x, we can use statement 2 to determine the value of y.
At this point, we can answer the target question with certainty, so the combined statements are SUFFICIENT
Answer = C
Cheers,
Brent
-
- Legendary Member
- Posts: 518
- Joined: Tue May 12, 2015 8:25 pm
- Thanked: 10 times