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$$\frac{\sqrt{1-x} + \frac{1}{\sqrt{1+x}}}{1 + \frac{1}{\sqrt{1-x}}}$$

I've had a go at putting everything over a common denominator in the form of:

$$\frac{\frac{\sqrt{1-x}\sqrt{1+x}+1}{\sqrt{1+x}}}{\frac{\sqrt{1-x}+1}{\sqrt{1-x}}} = \frac{\sqrt{1-x}(\sqrt{1-x^2}+1)}{(\sqrt{1-x}+1)\sqrt{1+x}}$$

Or multiplying the complex fraction by the conjugate of its base, but I'm getting nowhere.

Extensive searching hasn't made me realize the answer either— it has me baffled.

egreg
  • 238,574

1 Answers1

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From where you left off, to remove all radicals from the denominator, we could multiply the top and bottom by $\sqrt{1+x}(1-\sqrt{1-x})$ -- the former factor to remove the factor of $\sqrt{1+x}$, and the latter being the conjugate of $1+\sqrt{1-x}$. This would result with

\begin{align*} \frac{\sqrt{1-x}(\sqrt{1-x^2}+1)\sqrt{1+x}(1-\sqrt{1-x})}{(1+x)(1-(1-x))} &= \frac{\sqrt{1-x^2}(\sqrt{1-x^2}+1)(1-\sqrt{1-x})}{x(1+x)} \\ &= \frac{(1-x^2+\sqrt{1-x^2})(1-\sqrt{1-x})}{x(1+x)} \end{align*}

You could also expand the numerator, but I don't really think it seems "simpler".

\begin{align*} \frac{(1-x^2+\sqrt{1-x^2})(1-\sqrt{1-x})}{x(1+x)} &= \frac{1-x^2+\sqrt{1-x^2}-\sqrt{1-x}+x^2\sqrt{1-x}-(1-x)\sqrt{1+x}}{x(1+x)} \\ &= \frac{(x^2-1)\sqrt{1-x}+(x-1)\sqrt{1+x}+\sqrt{1-x}\sqrt{1+x}+1-x^2}{x(1+x)} \end{align*}

There are many different ways to write this expression.