Let the parabola meet the coordinate axes at the points P, Q and R. If the circle C with centre at passes through the points P, Q and R, then the area of is:
- A
- B
- C
- D
Let the parabola meet the coordinate axes at the points P, Q and R. If the circle C with centre at passes through the points P, Q and R, then the area of is:
Correct answer:B
Standard Method
Given: The parabola is and the circle has centre . The parabola meets the axes at points P, Q and R.
Find: The area of .
The intersections with the -axis are the roots of
Let these roots be and . Then
The -intercept is obtained by putting , so
Hence
Since the circle with centre passes through , its radius satisfies
So the equation of the circle is
Now for any -intercept of the parabola, the point is of the form . Substituting in the circle,
Thus
so
Therefore,
Take as the base. Its length is
The perpendicular distance of from the -axis is
Hence the area is
Therefore, the area of is . The correct option is B.
Using base and height directly
Given: is the -intercept of the parabola, so . The circle has centre and passes through all three intercept points.
Find: The area of .
From the circle, any point on the -axis lying on it has the form . So
which gives the two -intercepts directly as
Thus the base on the -axis is
and the height from to the -axis is
Therefore,
So the correct option is B.
A common mistake is to use only the parabola and try to determine first. That is unnecessary here because the circle condition directly gives the -intercepts. Use the circle equation at points of the form instead.
Students may take the height as because point has coordinate . Height is a distance, so it must be positive. Use height .
Another mistake is to forget that the base length is the distance between the two -intercepts, namely , not . Always take absolute difference for length.
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