Questions tagged [power-series]

Questions about the properties of functions of the form $\sum_{n=0}^{\infty}a_n (x-c)^n$, where the $a_n$ are real or complex numbers, and $x$ is real or complex.

A series of the form $$\sum_{n=0}^{\infty} a_n (x-c)^n$$ is called a power series, and can be used to expand functions. The center $c$ is often $0$ and the radius of convergence $R$ is given by $R = \left(\limsup\limits_{n\to\infty}\sqrt[n]{|a_n|}\right)^{-1}$.

Power series for some common functions are: \begin{align} \frac{1}{1-x}&=\sum_{n=0}^\infty x^n\quad(|x|\lt1)\\\ \ln(1+x)&=\sum_{n=0}^\infty\frac{(-1)^nx^{n+1}}{n+1}\quad(|x|\leq 1, x\neq -1)\\\ \arctan(x)&=\sum_{n=0}^\infty\frac{(-1)^nx^{2n+1}}{2n+1}\quad(|x|\leq 1,x\neq \pm i)\\\ \tan(x)&=\sum_{n=1}^{\infty}\frac{|B_{2n}|(4^n-1)4^n }{(2n)!}x^{2n-1}\quad(|x|< \pi/2)\\\ \sin(x)&=\sum_{n=0}^\infty\frac{(-1)^n x^{2n+1}}{(2n+1)!}\\\ \cos(x)&=\sum_{n=0}^\infty \frac{(-1)^n x^{2n}}{(2n)!}\\\ e^x &= \sum_{n=0}^\infty\frac{x^n}{n!}\\\ \end{align}

If convergence is not an issue or if you are working over a different domain than $\mathbb{R}$ or $\mathbb{C}$, consider using the tag instead.

8489 questions
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How to deal with power series that has $x^{2n+1}$, instead of $x^{n}$?

I'm wanting to find the radius of convergence and interval of convergence for a power series that isn't in the form $$\sum_{n=1}^{\infty} a_{n}x^{n}\tag{1}$$ but is instead in the form $$\sum_{n=1}^{\infty} a_{n}x^{2n+1}.\tag{2}$$ I'm having…
Old mate
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Power series of $\frac{1}{1+\frac{1}{4x}}$

Power series of $\frac{1}{1+\frac{1}{4x}}$ Now in an attempt to find this power series I used the known power series of: $\frac{1}{1+u} = 1-u+u^2-u^3+...$ Knowing this I simply substituted $\frac{1}{4x}$ as $u$ and found: $\frac{1}{1+\frac{1}{4x}} =…
user2250537
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Writing $\frac{1}{1 + w + w^2}$ as a power series and finding the ROC

I have to write the following: $\frac{1}{1 + w + w^2}$ as a power series: $$\sum_{n=0}^{\infty}{a_nw^n}$$ and find the radius of convergence of the series (in the complex plane). Obviously you can use the geometric series formula to obtain the…
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Given the first $n$ terms of a power series representation of $f$, find as many terms as possible for $1/f$

Given $f=\sum_{n}c_{n}x^{n}$, if we know the first $n$ terms of this sum, what can we say about the terms for $1/f$? I feel like we should be able to recover some of them. I believe it has to do with letting $1/f = \sum_{n}b_{n}x^{n}$ and then…
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How can $(z-1)^{-2}(z-2)^{-1}$ be represented as a Laurent series on $2<|z|<3$?

I'm trying to expand $\frac{1}{(z-1)^2(z-2)}$ with $z$ complex on the annulus $2<|z|<3$. I try rewriting it in partial fractions as $$ \frac{1}{(z-1)^2(z-2)}=-\frac{1}{z-1}-\frac{1}{(z-1)^2}+\frac{1}{z-2}. $$ I know I can make the last summand above…
Gillaspie
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Power Series Coefficients

Find the sum of the coefficients of $x^{20}$ and $x^{21}$ in the power series expansion of $\frac 1{(1-x^3)^4}$. I don't know a lot on power series at the moment, and I was wondering how do I find the coefficients? Thanks
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formal power series expansion for square root

i want to prove this identity: $(1 + \sum\limits_{n=1}^\infty {1/2 \choose n} X^n)^2 = 1+X$ in the formal power series ring Q[[X]]. (so i can't just quote the binomial expansion for the square root) the only thing i can think of is to calculate the…
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Working out $\tan x$ using sin and cos expansion

Using only the series expansions $\sin x = x- \dfrac{x^3} {3!} + \dfrac{x^5} {5!} + ...$ and $\cos x = 1 - \dfrac{x^2} {2!} + \dfrac{x^4}{4!} + ...$ Find the series expansions of the $\tan x$ function up to the $x^5$ term. So it is: $$ \frac {x-…
zcahfg2
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How do I plug in endpoints into a power series?

I don't understand how to plug in the endpoints into the original power series. The original power series is $$ \sum_{n=0}^\infty {(-1)^n x^n\over{n+1}} $$ What I have so far is this: I applied the ratio test $$ a_n= {(-1)^n x^n\over{n+1}}$$ $$…
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How to derive the formula to calculate the amount of cubes in a pyramid?

The pyramid looks like: For which I managed to derive the formula for the count of cube sides (ignoring the top). This was easy by simply thinking about it as a triangle: If we have 4 squares wide pyramid, then the total sides represented…
Volkkari
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Partial sums for a power series

I'm having trouble finding the formula for the partial sums of this series, $$\sum_{n=1}^{\infty\:}{nz^n}$$ where $z$ is a complex number. I'm not looking for the answer just a nudge in the right direction.
Crunch
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Radius of convergence of series with alternating coefficients

I need to compute, with proof, the radius of convergence $R$ for the series $$\sum_{k=0}^\infty \left(2-(-1)^n\right)^n z^n,$$ which is similar to a geometric series, except that the terms alternate between $z^n$ and $(3z)^n$. Clearly, we can…
David Zhang
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Finding Function of Series: $e^{-kx}$

If the series representation of $e^{-x}$ is: $$\sum_{k=0}^{\infty} \frac{(-x)^k}{k!} $$ Then what is for $e^{-kx}$?
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A Problem about Infinite Series

There is no idea to solve the question for me. Let $T\subset\mathbb N_{>0}$ be a finite set of positive integers. For each integer $n>0$, define $a_n$ to be the number of all finite sequences $(t_1,t_2,...,t_m)$ with $m\leq n$, $t_i\in T$ for all…
gaoxinge
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Computing the limit of function containing a power series.

Prove that if the sequence $a_{n}$ of real numbers converges to a finite limit; \begin{align} \lim_{n \rightarrow \infty} a_{n} = g, \end{align} then \begin{align} \lim_{x \to \infty} \left({\rm e}^{-x}\sum_{n = 0}^{\infty}a_{n}\,{x^{n} \over…
DRich
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