dana-farber cancer institute Recruitment Process, Interview Questions & Answers

Q: In a sports contest there were m medals awarded on n successive days (n > 1). 1. On the first day 1 medal and 1/7 of the remaining m - 1 medals were awarded. 2. On the second day 2 medals and 1/7 of the now remaining medals was awarded; and so on.On the nth and last day, the remaining n medals were awarded.How many days did the contest last, and how many medals were awarded altogether?

Q: Suppose a newly-born pair of rabbits, one male, one female, are put in a field. Rabbits are able to mate at the age of one month so that at the end of its second month a female can produce another pair of rabbits. Suppose that our rabbits never die and that the female always produces one new pair (one male, one female) every month from the second month on.

Q: Consider a pile of Diamonds on a table. A thief enters and steals 1/2 of the total quantity and then again 2 extra from the remaining. After some time a second thief enters and steals 1/2 of the remaining+2. Then 3rd thief enters and steals 1/2 of the remaining+2. Then 4th thief enters and steals 1/2 of the remaining+2. When the 5th one enters he finds 1 diamond on the table. Find out the total no. of diamonds originally on the table before the 1st thief entered.

Q: The citizens of planet nigiet are 8 fingered and have thus developed their decimal system in base 8. A certain street in nigiet contains 1000 (in base 8) buildings numbered 1 to 1000. How many 3s are used in numbering these buildings?

Q: A light bulb is hanging in a room. Outside of the room there are three switches, of which only one is connected to the lamp. In the starting situation, all switches are 'off' and the bulb is not lit. If it is allowed to check in the room only once.How would you know which is the switch?

Q: There are 3 sticks placed at right angles to each other and a sphere is placed between the sticks . Now another sphere is placed in the gap between the sticks and Larger sphere . Find the radius of smaller sphere in terms of radius of larger sphere.

Q: ABCDE are sisters. Each of them gives 4 gifts and each receives 4 gifts No two sisters give the same combination ( e.g. if A gives 4 gifts to B then no other sisters can give four to other one.) (i) B gives four to A.(ii) C gives 3 to E. How much did A,B,C,E give to D?

Q: Every day a cyclist meets a train at a particular crossing .The road is straight before the crossing and both are travelling in the same direction.Cyclist travels with a speed of 10 kmph.One day the cyclist come late by 25 minutes and meets the train 5 km before the crossing.What is the speed of the train?

Q: A long, long time ago, two Egyptian camel drivers were fighting for the hand of the daughter of the sheik of Abbudzjabbu. The sheik, who liked neither of these men to become the future husband of his daughter, came up with a clever plan: a race would dete

Q: Tom has three boxes with fruits in his barn: one box with apples, one box with pears, and one box with both apples and pears. The boxes have labels that describe the contents, but none of these labels is on the right box. How can Tom, by taking only one p

Q: A vessel is full of liquid. From the vessel, 1/3rd of the liquid evaporates on the first day. On the second day 3/4th of the remaining liquid evaporates. What fraction of the volume is present at the end of the second day

Q: Given a collection of points P in the plane , a 1-set is a point in P that can be separated from the rest by a line, .i.e the point lies on one side of the line while the others lie on the other side. The number of 1-sets of P is denoted by n1(P)....

Q: Consider a series in which 8 teams are participating. each team plays twice with all other teams. 4 of them will go to the semi final. How many matches should a team win, so that it will ensure that it will go to semi finals.?

Q: In a country where everyone wants a boy, each family continues having babies till they have a boy. After some time, what is the proportion of boys to girls in the country? (Assuming probability of having a boy or a girl is the same)

Q: A Man is sitting in the last coach of train could not find a seat, so he starts walking to the front coach ,he walks for 5 min and reaches front coach. Not finding a seat he walks back to last coach and when he reaches there,train had completed 5 miles. what is the speed of the train ?

Q: There are some chickens in a poultry. They are fed with corn. One sack of corn will come for 9 days. The farmer decides to sell some chickens and wanted to hold 12 chicken with him. He cuts the feed by 10% and sack of corn comes for 30...

Q: In mathematics country 1,2,3,4....,8,9 are nine cities. Cities which form a no. that is divisible by 3 are connected by air planes. (e.g. cities 1 & 2 form no. 12 which divisible by 3 then 1 is connected to city 2). Find the total no. of ways you can go to 8 if you are allowed to break the journeys.

Q: On a particular day A and B decide that they would either speak the truth or will lie. C asks A whether he is speaking truth or lying? He answers and B listens to what he said. C then asks B what A has said B says "A says that he is a liar"

Q: Six persons A,B,C,D,E & F went to solider cinema. There are six consecutive seats. A sits in one of the seats followed by B, followed by C and soon. If a taken one of the six seats , then B should sit adjacent to A. C should sit adjacent A or B. D should sit adjacent to A, B,or C and soon. How many possibilities are there?

Q: In a certain year, the number of girls who graduated from City High School was twice the number of boys. If 3/4 of the girls and 5/6 of the boys went to college immediately after graduation, what fraction of the graduates that year went to college immediately after graduation?