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Test
Math
Domain
Geometry and Trigonometry
Skill
Right triangles and trigonometry
Difficulty
Medium
ID: a5aee181
Modded SAT Question Bank by Abdullah Mallik

The length of a rectangle’s diagonal is 517, and the length of the rectangle’s shorter side is 5. What is the length of the rectangle’s longer side?

  1. 17

  2. 20

  3. 152

  4. 400


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Correct Answer: B
Rationale

Choice B is correct. A rectangle’s diagonal divides a rectangle into two congruent right triangles, where the diagonal is the hypotenuse of both triangles. It’s given that the length of the diagonal is 517 and the length of the rectangle’s shorter side is 5. Therefore, each of the two right triangles formed by the rectangle’s diagonal has a hypotenuse with length 517, and a shorter leg with length 5. To calculate the length of the longer leg of each right triangle, the Pythagorean theorem, a2+b2=c2, can be used, where a and b are the lengths of the legs and c is the length of the hypotenuse of the triangle. Substituting 5 for a and 517 for c in the equation a2+b2=c2  yields 52+b2=5172, which is equivalent to 25+b2=2517, or 25+b2=425. Subtracting 25 from each side of this equation yields b2=400. Taking the positive square root of each side of this equation yields b=20. Therefore, the length of the longer leg of each right triangle formed by the diagonal of the rectangle is 20. It follows that the length of the rectangle’s longer side is 20.

Choice A is incorrect and may result from dividing the length of the rectangle’s diagonal by the length of the rectangle’s shorter side, rather than substituting these values into the Pythagorean theorem.

Choice C is incorrect and may result from using the length of the rectangle’s diagonal as the length of a leg of the right triangle, rather than the length of the hypotenuse.

Choice D is incorrect. This is the square of the length of the rectangle’s longer side.

Question Difficulty: Medium
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