Connections of Putnam and IMC with research in Mathematics

[flamengo]

Is it true that some problems from Putnam and IMC have connections to Mathematics at the research level and it's necessary to use techniques at that level to solve them ? If so, could someone give me examples of Real Analysis problems of this type ?

 

[jedishrfu]

It would seem that these problems come from basic knowledge of college mathematics and not from fundamental research in mathematics.

The Putnam competition now takes place on the first Saturday in December, and consists of two three-hour sittings separated by a lunch break. The test is supervised by faculty members at the participating schools. Each competitor attempts to solve twelve problems, which can typically be solved with only basic knowledge of college mathematics but which require extensive creative thinking.

from the wikipedia article:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Lowell_Putnam_Mathematical_Competition

Here's more on the Putnam with problems from past competitions:

http://www.math.harvard.edu/putnam/

and

http://kskedlaya.org/putnam-archive/