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LECTURE 7

POWER SERIES
A power series is a polynomial with infinitely many terms. Here is an example:

Like a polynomial, a power series is a function of 𝒙. That is, we can substitute in

different values of 𝑥 to get different results. For example,

and

Though power series may seem complicated, they are actually not much more difficult
to deal with than polynomials. For example, it is easy to take the derivative of a power
series:

and it is just as easy to take the integral:

As you can see, a power series is not much more complicated than a polynomial.

TAYLOR SERIES
Consider again the power series

As we have seen, it is easy to compute the sum of this series for different
values of 𝑥. For example,

In fact, no matter what value of 𝑥 we plug in, the result is always a geometric series.
The first term of this series is 1, and the common ratio is always 𝑥.

Indeed, the entire power series

can be thought of as a geometric series with a common ratio of 𝑥. This

ME223 – ADVANCED MATHEMATICS FOR MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Engr. Dennis E. Ganas
Mechanical Engineering Department MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
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gives us a simple formula for the sum:

This is our first example of a Taylor series—a power series that adds up to a known
function.

So which functions can be expressed as power series? The answer may surprise
you:

All of these functions—the exponential, the sine, the cosine, the logarithm, the inverse
tangent— all of them are really just polynomials!
This result seems to good to be true. How is it possible that something like
polynomial? According to the table above,

Why would this be true? Well, the defining property of /B is that it is equal to its own
derivative:

However, the Taylor series for 𝑒 𝑥 is also equal to its own derivative:

ME223 – ADVANCED MATHEMATICS FOR MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Engr. Dennis E. Ganas
Mechanical Engineering Department MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
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Based on this observation alone, it seems reasonable that the two functions might be
the same.

Unfortunately, we are not yet in a position to fully explain the formulas above. The goal
of the next two sections is to learn how to express various functions as power series.
By the time we are done, you will understand all five of these formulas.

GEOMETRIC POWER SERIES

Recall the formula for the sum of a geometric series:

As we have seen, this formula works perfectly well when 𝑎 and 𝑟 are functions of 𝑥. For
example, plugging in 𝑎 = 1 and 𝑟 = 𝑥 gives the formula

There are many more series we can get this way. For example, using 𝑎 = 1 and 𝑟 =
−𝑥 gives

and using 𝑎 = 𝑥 and 𝑟 = 2𝑥 gives,

EXAMPLE 1 Find a formula for the sum of the following series:

SOLUTION This is a geometric series with a common ratio of 𝟐𝒙𝟑 The first term is 𝒙𝟐,
so

EXAMPLE 2 Find a power series representation for each of the following functions:

ME223 – ADVANCED MATHEMATICS FOR MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Engr. Dennis E. Ganas
Mechanical Engineering Department MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
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SOLUTION

(a) This should be the sum of a geometric series with 𝑎 = 𝑥 and 𝑟 = 3𝑥:

(b) This is the sum of a geometric series with 𝑎 = 1 and 𝑟 = 𝑥 2 :

DIFFERENTIATION AND INTEGRATION

You can differentiate an integrate power series term-by-term, just as you would a
polynomial:

1
EXAMPLE 3 Find a power series representation for .
(1−𝑥) 2
SOLUTION Observe that:

But

Therefore

We now come to our first major task: finding a power series for the natural logarithm.

EXAMPLE 4 Find a Taylor series for ln(1 + 𝑥).

SOLUTION Observe that

1
But is the sum of a geometric power series:
1+𝑥

ME223 – ADVANCED MATHEMATICS FOR MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Engr. Dennis E. Ganas
Mechanical Engineering Department MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
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Integrating both sides gives:

Plugging in 𝑥 = 0 reveals that 𝐶 = 0 . Therefore:

The formula we just derived is our first really important result:

We can find a power series for the inverse tangent using the same method:

EXAMPLE 5 Find a Taylor series for 𝑡𝑎𝑛−1 𝑥

SOLUTION Recall that

1
But is the sum of a geometric series with 𝑎 = 1 and 𝑟 = −𝑥 2
1+𝑥2

Integrating both sides gives:

Plugging in 𝑥 = 0 reveals that 𝐶 = 0 , so:

The result was:

ME223 – ADVANCED MATHEMATICS FOR MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Engr. Dennis E. Ganas
Mechanical Engineering Department MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
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EXAMPLE 6 Express the integral: as the sum of an infinite series.

SOLUTION Note that this integral would be very difficult to evaluate on its own.
However, the integrand is the sum of a geometric series:

Therefore:

SUBSTITUTION AND MULTIPLICATION

There are two more important tricks for working with power series. The first is
substitution:

EXAMPLE 7 Find a power series representation for tan −1 (𝑥2 )

SOLUTION The power series for tan−1 𝑥 is:

All we need to do is substitute in 𝑥 2 for 𝑥:

Though this method is very simple, it often comes off as confusing because of the two
different 𝑥′𝑠. The idea here is that:

for any 𝑢 . All we are doing is substituting 𝑢 = 𝑥 2. You can think of many geometric
series this way. For example, the series:

1
can be obtained by substituting 𝑥 7 into the power series for .
1−𝑥

ME223 – ADVANCED MATHEMATICS FOR MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Engr. Dennis E. Ganas
Mechanical Engineering Department MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
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EXAMPLE 8 Find a power series representation for ln(1 − 𝑥 5 ).

SOLUTION We know that:

Substituting in −𝑥 5 for 𝑥 yields:

Power series can also be added, subtracted, and multiplied like polynomials.

EXAMPLE 9 Find a power series representation for 𝑥 3 𝑡𝑎𝑛−1 𝑥

SOLUTION We have:

SUMMATIONS FOR POWER SERIES

It is sometimes difficult to express a power series in summation notation. We give a few
examples.

EXAMPLE 10 Express the series below using summation notation:

SOLUTION For this series, it seems easiest to have the first term be 𝑛 = 1, the second
term be 𝑛 = 2 and so on:

1
As you can see, the coefficient is always . The power of 𝑥 is increasing by 4 each time,
𝑛
so it should be similar to 4𝑛. Indeed, it looks like the power of𝑥 is 4𝑛 − 1, so:

EXAMPLE 11 Express the series below using summation notation:

SOLUTION This time we start with 𝑛 = 0 :

ME223 – ADVANCED MATHEMATICS FOR MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Engr. Dennis E. Ganas
Mechanical Engineering Department MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
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The alternating + and − signs can be taken care of with ( −1) 𝑛. It is important here that
the an even-numbered terms are positive (which is why we decided to start at 𝑛 = 0 ).
If the odd numbered terms were positive, we would need (−1) 𝑛−1 .

The power of 𝑥 is an arithmetic sequence that increases by 2 each time. In particular,

the formula for the power is, so it should be similar to 2𝑛 + 1, so

The following table shows the summation notation for each of our five primary series:

ME223 – ADVANCED MATHEMATICS FOR MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Engr. Dennis E. Ganas
Mechanical Engineering Department MECHANICAL ENGINEERING
 9

ASSIGNMENT:

1. Derive the Taylor series expansion of the following functions:

A. sin 𝑥 B. cos 𝑥

2. Find a power series representation for the function using the formula for the sum of
a geometric series.
𝑥 𝑥2
A. 𝑓 (𝑥) = B. 𝑓 (𝑥) = 4
1−𝑥 1−𝑥

3. Find a power series representation for the given function.

A. 𝑓 (𝑥) = ln(1 − 𝑥) B. 𝑓 (𝑥) = 𝑒 3𝑥

4. Express the integral as an infinite series.

1 𝑥
A. ∫ 4
𝑑𝑥 B. ∫ 𝑑𝑥
1+𝑥 1+𝑥 5

0.5 1
5. Use power series to estimate the integral ∫0 𝑑𝑥 to within 0.00001.
1+𝑥 6

DUE DATE: April 10, 2021 5pm.

Submit in USTeP only.

ME223 – ADVANCED MATHEMATICS FOR MECHANICAL ENGINEERS

Engr. Dennis E. Ganas
Mechanical Engineering Department MECHANICAL ENGINEERING