Ten tasters finding one poisoned wine barrel
Question
Exactly one of barrels of wine is poisoned. Ten volunteers can taste wine; anyone who drinks poison dies exactly one month later and otherwise survives, and there is only time for a single round of tasting lasting that month. What is the largest for which the poisoned barrel can always be identified?
Short answer
. Each volunteer's fate is one bit, so ten volunteers give distinguishable outcomes. Label barrels to in binary and have volunteer sip every barrel whose -th bit is ; the set of deaths spells out the poisoned label.
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