The Art of Combinatorial Balance
Welcome, future engineers! Today, we are going to unravel a problem that sits at the very heart of combinatorics. It is not just about crunching numbers; it is about organizing chaos.
Imagine you are standing in front of two rooms, Group A and Group B. In Group A, we have 4 men and 5 women. In Group B, we have 5 men and 4 women.
Our mission is to form a team of 8 people by selecting exactly 4 from each room, such that the final team has exactly 4 men and 4 women. This is a classic JEE problem that tests your ability to handle constraints systematically.
The Constraint as an Anchor
When you face a problem with multiple constraints, the secret is to find an anchor. Here, our anchor is the number of men.
Let mA be the number of men we select from Group A, and mB be the number of men we select from Group B. We know that the total number of men must be 4, so we have the equation:
Because we are selecting exactly 4 people from each group, once we fix mA, the number of women from Group A is automatically fixed as 4−mA. Similarly, mB determines the number of women from Group B as 4−mB. This dependency is the key to unlocking the problem.
Breaking Down the Cases
Since the cases are mutually exclusive, we must analyze each scenario separately. Let us walk through them:
Case 1: mA=4,mB=0
We select 4 men from Group A and 0 men from Group B. The number of ways is:
(44)×(05)×(05)×(44)=1×1×1×1=1 way
Case 2: mA=3,mB=1
Here, we select 3 men and 1 woman from Group A, and 1 man and 3 women from Group B. The calculation is:
((34)×(15))×((15)×(34))=(4×5)×(5×4)=400 ways
Case 3: mA=2,mB=2
This is the most balanced case. We select 2 men and 2 women from each group. The calculation is:
((24)×(25))×((25)×(24))=(6×10)×(10×6)=3600 ways
Case 4: mA=1,mB=3
We select 1 man and 3 women from Group A, and 3 men and 1 woman from Group B. The calculation is:
((14)×(35))×((35)×(14))=(4×10)×(10×4)=1600 ways
Case 5: mA=0,mB=4
Finally, we select 0 men and 4 women from Group A, and 4 men and 0 women from Group B. The calculation is:
((04)×(45))×((45)×(04))=(1×5)×(5×1)=25 ways
The Final Summation
Now, we bring it all together. Since these cases are mutually exclusive, we apply the addition rule.
The total number of ways is the sum of all these cases:
It is a beautiful, symmetric result. The lesson here is simple: when the problem feels overwhelming, break it down into smaller, manageable pieces. You have the tools; now go forth and solve with confidence! The final answer is 5626.