Directions: Read the information and answer the given questions. Eight…

Concept: In a birth-year ranking puzzle, arranging people by birth year is the same as arranging them by age (earlier year = older), because every age here is measured against one fixed reference year, 2025. A clue like "exactly N people born between A and B" fixes the RANK-GAP between A and B once all eight years are sorted; "immediately before/after" fixes ADJACENT ranks. Direct numeric clues (an age being a perfect cube, an age crossing a threshold, or an age gap between two people) then prune which specific year each person can hold.

Application:

1. Convert the eight birth years to ages as of 2025: 1966 to 59, 1976 to 49, 1982 to 43, 1989 to 36, 1997 to 28, 1998 to 27, 2006 to 19, 2012 to 13.

2. Among these eight ages, the only perfect cube is 27 (3 cubed), so Q’s birth year is fixed at 1998 (6th earliest of the eight years).

3. "Exactly one person born between U and Q" means U’s rank is two positions from Q’s rank, so U is at 1989 (4th earliest) or at 2012 (8th, the latest year).

4. "Exactly two people born between U and W" fixes W three ranks from U. From U = 1989, W lands on 1966 or 2006; from U = 2012, W lands on 1997. The clue "W is older than 20 years" (born before 2005) removes 2006 from the first branch, leaving two live branches: (U = 1989, W = 1966) and (U = 2012, W = 1997).

5. "V was born immediately before P" (adjacent ranks) combined with "both P and V are younger than 45 years" (born after 1980) is tested in each branch: the (U = 1989, W = 1966) branch gives the adjacent pair V = 2006, P = 2012, and the (U = 2012, W = 1997) branch gives the adjacent pair V = 1982, P = 1989 — both still satisfy this step, so both branches continue.

6. The three years left over in each branch go to R, S and T. "The age difference between T and S is at most 10 years, with S being younger" allows only one (S, T) pairing per branch, leaving one year for R. Checking that leftover R against "R’s age is at most 20 years less than S’s age": the (U = 2012) branch puts R’s age 30 years below S’s age, breaking the 20-year limit, while the (U = 1989) branch puts R’s age exactly 15 years below S’s age, which fits.

7. Only the (U = 1989, W = 1966) branch satisfies every condition, which fixes all eight years: W = 1966, T = 1976, S = 1982, U = 1989, R = 1997, Q = 1998, V = 2006, P = 2012.

Cross-check: Re-checking all nine clues against this table confirms it: two people (1976, 1982) fall between W (1966) and U (1989); one person (1997) falls between U (1989) and Q (1998); W’s age 59 is above 20; P’s age 13 and V’s age 19 are both below 45; Q’s age 27 is a perfect cube; R’s age 28 is 15 years below S’s age 43 (within the 20-year limit); V (2006) sits immediately before P (2012); and T’s age 49 is 6 years above S’s age 43 (within the 10-year limit, S younger). Among the five named options, the ages are P = 13, Q = 27, W = 59, S = 43 and T = 49, so W holds the highest age and is the oldest of the five — and of all eight people in the group.