2023 Computational and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions Solutions Part A: Questions 1-6 1. One-way Mirrors We trace the beam as shown, remembering to reflect when the beam hits the dark side of a mirror and to go straight through when it hits the light side. ‘The beam exits the maze at D. Hence (D). Page 292023 Computational and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions 2. Circuit Solver Working from left to right, we add labels to the wires to indicate the input and output numbers at each gate. The unknown output at the missing gate is indicated by “?” on the wire, The final multiplication gate has one input of 4 and an output of 20, so the unknown input must be 5. This is also the output at the missing gate, which has inputs 12 and 7. So the missing gate must be a subtraction gate. Hence (B), Page 302023 Computational and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions 3. Conquest In the diagram below, the number below the line represents the size of the defending team, and the number above the line represents the new size of the attacking team after it has absorbed the defending team. A X indicates that the attacking team is smaller than the defending team, or because a castle on the path to it has a larger defending team than the attacking one. Where a team could be attacked from below or from the left, it will be attacked by the larger team. Finish feet etfs tefl fei—tet fet iel—ief Start The green line shows the route that leads to the largest team at the finish. The size of this team is 40. Hence (C), Page 3)2023 Computational and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions 4. Loki’s Landscapers Elle will take the longest, so Loki should instruct her first. Then Beau, Jesse, Juliet and finally Aurora, The last to finish is Jesse, after 39 minutes, which would make it 12:39 pm, Hence (F). 5. Grid Robot Tracing the robot's steps we have: After X After Y Sart Sax LF LE San F LF a We can now see that the effect of Y is to draw a U-shaped clockwise pattem, We can now complete the instructions for Z = YRY. After Y After YR After YRY il | Be | Siar Start Kx Hence (C), Page 322028 Comp 6. Overtaking Siding Our first step is to move the 9 wagon to the left. ‘To do this we must first move the 6 and 8 wagons into the siding. We would like to move the 8 wagon next to the 9, but the 6 is in the way. However, we can move the 7 wagon next to the 9, We can now move the 6 and 8 wagons, followed by the 5. ‘We now need to move the 3 onto the siding so the 4 can move across. Finally, we move the 2 and the 3. 68927534 a ) 9 27534 Ns ) 97 534 N68 ) 97685 34 ) 976854 ) 97685423 NO In general, we can arrange the wagons to form the largest train number by doing the following: 1, If the siding is empty, we can move the wagon with the largest number by moving any wagons to its left to the siding 2. If the siding is not empty, let ws be the number of the left-most wagon in the siding and wr the largest number on the wagons remaining on the right end of the track. Then, ifwt > ws ‘move the wagon with number wr to the left side of the track, as above, else move the left-most wagon in the siding. This results in the train having the train number 97685423, The last three digits are 423, Hence (D). fonal and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions Page 332023 Computational and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions Part B: Questions 7-9 7. Bernie’s Calculator AL 4354x1043. Bernie will need 5 presses (~ +++ x) to reach 40, then another 3 (+++) to reach 43, Hence the number of presses is 5+3 = 8. B. 4326 = (43 x 10+2) x 1046. Bernie will need 8 presses (as in A) to reach 43, another 3 (x + +) to reach 432, and another 7 (x + +++ + +) to reach 4326. Hence the number of presses is 8 +3 + 18, C, We can take a shortcut by observing that we will need. (4=1) presses of the x button, where d is the number of digits, and n presses of the + button for each digit m. So the number of button presses = number of digits —1 + sum of digits. Hence the number of presses for 456345782 is 9 — 1 +44 = 52. 8. Purple Fungus Solution 1 We shade squares that have two or more neighbours. ‘There will typically be several generations. In the diagrams the number in a square represents the generation of the fungus. ‘The dishes at the start of the experiment are generation 1. A. Eventually 24 dishes contain fungus. Page 34Solution 2 Consider: 2023 Computational and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions fo Ebaby ‘We can recognise that each of the 2, 3 and 4 squares will eventually be filled, and we can short-cut the process by filling in several squares at a time, The squares that we fill in will result in a filled-in rectangle. fom Earn] Another example: Instead of Short-cut oo ie Note that the numbers no longer represent the generations — just the order in which we filled the grid. For the diagrams in the question, A Eventually 24 dishes contain fungus. Page 352023 Computational and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions Eventually (9 x 9) = 81 dishes contain fungus. Eventually (39) +3-+ (3x7) +1 = 52 dishes contain fungus, Page 362023 Computational and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions 9. One Free Ride A. Without a free ride Chen would choose the cheaper of the two parallel legs. ‘This would cost him 6743 +442 = 22. He would use his free ticket on the most expensive leg, giving a final cost of 2-7=15 B. Without a free ride Chen would choose the cheaper of the two parallel loops, the ‘upper having two legs and the lower having one. This would cost him 3444(144)454(145) +44545+6=23 He would use his free ticket on a lower leg, rather than one of the legs on the upper loop. He would use his free ride on the lower leg of the loop that saves him the most: He saves most on the fifth loop, using his free ride on the bottom leg. This avoids the (1 +5 = 6) fares on the two legs on the upper loop. His total cost will be 23 — 6 = 17. Page 5:2023 Computational and Algorithmic Thinking — Junior Solutions C. Consider the following parallel loops: — Without a free ride Chen would | Without a free ride Chen would choose the upper loop for a cost of | choose the upper loop for a cost of 44+2=6. 243=5 He could use the free ride to avoid | He could use the free ride to avoid the 4. He would still travel on the | the 6. He would now choose the upper loop but at a cost of 2. lower loop for a cost of 1 Doing so would save him 6—2=4. | Doing so would save him 5 — From these examples we see that the savings from using a free ride in a loop is the cost ofthe cheaper part of the loop (upper or lower) — the cost of the cheapest leg. Without a free ride Chen would choose the legs in bold, This would cost him (142)+2+2) 4243) 4 (143) 4344) =344454447=23 ‘We can now determine the best leg to get for free. Loop cheaper cost cheapest leg 4 7 1 saving 3 5 + 2 5 Chen can save 5 by taking the lower part of the last loop and using his free ticket, on the 6. His cost will be 23 — 5 = 18. Page 38