bad wording

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bad wording

by deagez » Sat Sep 05, 2009 12:16 pm
This is from the mba.com practice test so i am surprised it is worded so poorly. But then again maybe I am just not understanding something that I should.

What is the greatest possible area of a triangular region with on vertex at the center of a circle of radius 1 and the other two vertices on the circle?

a) (square root of 3) / 4
b) 1/2
c)pi/4
d)1
e)square root of 2

answer is 1/2 (b)

please help explain
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by capnx » Sat Sep 05, 2009 4:26 pm
there's a discussion here:
https://www.beatthegmat.com/largest-area ... html#50963

basically, one corner of the triangle is AT the centre of the circle, the other two are ON the circle.
maximum area for a triangle is right triangle. so the base and height are equal to r which is 1. area = b*h*0.5 = 1*1*0.5 = 1/2
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