A cube is painted and cut into 64 smaller but identical pieces by making the minimum possible number of cuts. What is the minimum number of cuts required to cut a cube?

Formula used:

Minimum number of cuts = (n_x -1) + (ny -1) + (nz -1)

Calculation:

Number of  identical pieces 64 = 4 × 4 × 4

Hence, we need 3 cuts in Z-direction, 3 cuts in the Y-direction, and 3 cuts in the X-direction.

Means our cube cut into 4 parts along Z-directions say,

Here, n_x = 4, n_y = 4, n_z = 4 

Put all values in the given formula,

Minimum number of cuts = (4 -1) + (4 -1) + (4 -1) = 3 + 3 + 3 = 9

Here, the minimum number of cuts required to cut a cube is 9.

Hence, the correct answer is "9".