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arXiv · 1512.07338

Chameleon Coins

Tanya Khovanova·Konstantin Knop·Oleg Polubasov
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Abstract

We discuss coin-weighing problems with a new type of coin: a chameleon. A chameleon coin can mimic a fake or a real coin, and it can choose which coin to mimic for each weighing independently. We consider a mix of $N$ coins that include exactly two non-real coins: one fake and one chameleon. The task is to use a balance to find two coins one of which has to be fake. We find bounds for the number of coins for which we can find a solution in a given number of weighings. We also introduce an important idea of solution scaling.

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Tanya Khovanova, Konstantin Knop, Oleg Polubasov. 2015-12-23. Chameleon Coins. https://arxiv.org/abs/1512.07338

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