Cubic function

In mathematics, a cubic function is a function of the form

where the coefficients a, b, c, and d are real numbers, and the

variable x takes real values, and a ≠ 0. In other words, it is both a
polynomial function of degree three, and a real function. In
particular, the domain and the codomain are the set of the real
numbers.

Setting f(x) = 0 produces a cubic equation of the form

Graph of a cubic function with 3
real roots (where the curve crosses
the horizontal axis—where y = 0).
whose solutions are called roots of the function. The case shown has two critical
points. Here the function is
A cubic function has either one or three real roots (the existence of f(x) = (x3 + 3x2 − 6x − 8)/4.
at least one real root is true for all odd-degree polynomial
functions).

The graph of a cubic function always has a single inflection point. It may have two critical points, a local
minimum and a local maximum. Otherwise, a cubic function is monotonic. The graph of a cubic function
is symmetric with respect to its inflection point; that is, it is invariant under a rotation of a half turn
around this point. Up to an affine transformation, there are only three possible graphs for cubic functions.

Cubic functions are fundamental for cubic interpolation.

Contents
History
Critical and inflection points
Classification
Symmetry
Collinearities
Cubic interpolation
Reference
External links

History

Critical and inflection points

The critical points of a cubic function are its stationary
points, that is the points where the slope of the function is
zero. Thus the critical points of a cubic function f defined
by

f(x) = ax3 + bx2 + cx + d,

occur at values of x such that the derivative

of the cubic function is zero.

The solutions of this equation are the x-values of the

critical points and are given, using the quadratic formula,
by

The roots, stationary points, inflection point

and concavity of a cubic polynomial x3 − 3x2 −
144x + 432 (black line) and its first and
The sign of the expression inside the square root second derivatives (red and blue).
determines the number of critical points. If it is positive,
then there are two critical points, one is a local
maximum, and the other is a local minimum. If b2 – 3ac = 0, then there is only one critical point,
which is an inflection point. If b2 – 3ac < 0, then there are no (real) critical points. In the two latter
cases, that is, if b2 – 3ac is nonpositive, the cubic function is strictly monotonic. See the figure for an
example of the case Δ0 > 0.

The inflection point of a function is where that function changes concavity. An inflection point occurs
when the second derivative is zero, and the third derivative is nonzero. Thus a cubic function has always
a single inflection point, which occurs at

Classification
The graph of a cubic function is an example of a cubic curve. (Many cubic curves are not graphs of
functions.)

Although cubic functions depend on four parameters, their graph can have only very few shapes. In fact,
the graph of a cubic function is always similar to the graph of a function of the form

This similarity can be built as the composition of translations parallel to the coordinates axes, a
homothecy (uniform scaling), and, possibly, a reflection (mirror image) with respect to the y-axis. A
further non-uniform scaling can transform the graph into the graph of one among the three cubic
functions
This means that there are only three graphs of cubic functions up
to an affine transformation.

The above geometric transformations can be built in the

following way, when starting from a general cubic function

Firstly, if a < 0, the change of variable x → –x allows

supposing a > 0. After this change of variable, the new graph is Cubic functions of the form
the mirror image of the previous one, with respect of the y-axis.
The graph of any cubic function is
b similar to such a curve.
Then, the change of variable x = x1 – 3a provides a function of
the form

This corresponds to a translation parallel to the x-axis.

The change of variable y = y1 + q corresponds to a translation with respect to the y-axis, and gives a
function of the form

The change of variable corresponds to a uniform scaling, and give, after division by
a function of the form

which is the simplest form that can be obtained by a similarity.

Then, if p ≠ 0, the non-uniform scaling gives, after division by

where has the value 1 or –1, depending on the sign of p. If one defines the latter
form of the function applies to all cases.

Symmetry
For a cubic function of the form the inflection point is thus the origin. As such a function
is an odd function, its graph is symmetric with respect to the inflection point, and invariant under a
rotation of a half turn around the inflection point. As these properties are invariant by similarity, the
following is true for all cubic functions.

The graph of a cubic function is symmetric with respect to its inflection point, and is invariant under a
rotation of a half turn around the inflection point.

Collinearities
The tangent lines to the graph of a cubic function at three
collinear points intercept the cubic again at collinear points.[1]
This can be seen as follows.

As this property is invariant under a rigid motion, one may

suppose that the function has the form

If α is a real number, then the tangent to the graph of f at the

point (α, f(α)) is the line

{(x, f(α) + (x − α)f ′(α)) : x ∈ R}.

So, the intersection point between this line and the graph of f can
be obtained solving the equation f(x) = f(α) + (x − α)f ′(α),
that is

The points P1, P2, and P3 (in blue)

are collinear and belong to the graph
which can be rewritten 3 5 5
of x3 + x2 − x + . The points
2 2 4
T1, T2, and T3 (in red) are the
intersections of the (dotted) tangent
lines to the graph at these points with
and factorized as the graph itself. They are collinear
too.

So, the tangent intercepts the cubic at

So, the function that maps a point (x, y) of the graph to the other point where the tangent intercepts the
graph is

This is an affine transformation that transforms collinear points into collinear points. This proves the
claimed result.

Cubic interpolation
Given the values of a function and its derivative at two points, there is exactly one cubic function that has
the same four values, which is called a cubic Hermite spline.
There are two standard ways for using this fact. Firstly, if one knows, for example by physical
measurement, the values of a function and its derivative at some sampling points, one can interpolate the
function with a continuously differentiable function, which is a piecewise cubic function.

If the value of a function is known at several points, cubic interpolation consists in approximating the
function by a continuously differentiable function, which is piecewise cubic. For having a uniquely
defined interpolation, two more constraints must be added, such as the values of the derivatives at the
endpoints, or a zero curvature at the endpoints.

Reference
1. Whitworth, William Allen (1866), "Equations of the third degree", Trilinear Coordinates and
Other Methods of Modern Analytical Geometry of Two Dimensions (https://archive.org/detail
s/trilinearcoordin00whit), Cambridge: Deighton, Bell, and Co., p. 425, retrieved June 17,
2016

External links
Hazewinkel, Michiel, ed. (2001) [1994], "Cardano formula" (https://www.encyclopediaofmat
h.org/index.php?title=p/c020350), Encyclopedia of Mathematics, Springer
Science+Business Media B.V. / Kluwer Academic Publishers, ISBN 978-1-55608-010-4
History of quadratic, cubic and quartic equations (http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/histor
y/HistTopics/Quadratic_etc_equations.html) on MacTutor archive.

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