317

Appendix B

Gaussian Elimination Method

This is the elementary elimination method, and it reduces the system of equations to an
equivalent upper triangular system which can be solved by back substitution. Although
quite general, we shall describe this method by considering a system of three equations
for the sake of clarity and simplicity.
Let the system be
a11 x1 + a12 x2 + a13 x3 = b1
a21 x1 + a22 x2 + a23 x3 = b2 B1
a31 x1 + a32 x2 + a33 x3 = b3
We first form the augmented matrix of the system (Equation B.1), namely,
a11 a12 a13 b1
a21 a22 a23 b2 B2
a31 a32 a33 b3
To eliminate xl from the second equation, we multiply the first equation by (−a21/a11)
and then add it to the second equation. Similarly, to eliminate x1 from the third equation,
we multiply the first equation by (−a31/a11) and add it to the third. This procedure can be
shown thus:
a21 a11 a12 a13 b1
−
a11
a31 a21 a22 a23 b2 B3
a11 a31 a32 a33 b3

where (−a21/a11) and (−a31/a11) are called the multipliers for the first stage of elimina-
tion. In this stage, we have assumed that a11 0. The first equation is called the pivotal
equation and a11 is called the first pivot. At the end of the first stage, the augmented
matrix (Equation B.3) becomes
a11 a12 a13 b1
a
− 32 0 a22 a23 b2 B4
a22
0 a32 a33 b3

Drying and Storage of Cereal Grains, Second Edition. B. K. Bala.

© 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Published 2017 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
318 Appendix B

where a 22, a 23, … all changed elements. a 22 is the new pivot and the multiplier is
(−a 32/a 22). At the end of the second stage, we have the upper triangular system

a11 a12 a13 b1

0 a22 a23 b2 B5
0 0 a33 b3

from which the values of x1, x2 and x3 can be obtained by back substitution.
It is clear that the method will fail if one of the points a11, a 22 or a 33 vanishes. In such
case, the method can be modified by rearranging the rows so that the pivot is non-zero.
This procedure is called partial pivoting and can be easily implemented on a computer.
If this is impossible, then the matrix is singular and the equations have no solution.
In particular, the number of non-zero diagonal elements in Equation B.5 will represent
the rank of the original matrix.

Example B.1
Solve the following system:

2x + y + z = 10
3x + 2y + 3z = 18
x + 4y + 9z = 16

Solution
In the first stage, the multipliers are −3/2 and −1/2. We multiply the first equation
successively by −3/2 and −1/2 and add it to the second and third equations, respectively,
to obtain
1 3
y+ z=3
2 2
and
7 17
y+ = 11
2 2

The augmented matrix therefore becomes

2 1 1 10
0 1 2 3 2 3
0 7 2 17 2 11

At the second stage, we eliminated y from the third equation by multiplying the
second equation by −7 and adding it to the third. The resulting system will be upper
triangular:
 Appendix B 319

2x + y + z = 10
1 3
y+ z=3
2 2
− 2z = − 10

Back substitution gives the solution

x = 7, y = −9 and z = 5.