THE BINOMIAL THEOREM

Emmanuel Djabang

Department of Mathematics
University of Ghana

February 8, 2023

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Outline

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A look at Pascal s Triangle
Expanding Binomials
Permutation and Combination
The Binomial Theorem
Applying the Binomial Theorem
Further Examples
Class Exercises

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Assumed Knowledge

Basic skills for simplifying algebraic expressions.

Expanding brackets.
Factoring linear and quadratic expressions.
Some experience in working with polynomials.

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 0
A look at Pascal s triangle

Consider the following expansions:

(a + b)2 = a2 + 2ab + b2
(a + b)3 = a3 + 3a2 b + 3ab2 + b3
(a + b)4 = a4 + 4a3 b + 6a2 b2 + 4ab3 + b4

Note that:
the expansion of (a + b)2 has three terms and in each term the
sum of the indices is 2
the expansion of (a + b)3 has four terms and in each term the sum
of the indices is 3.
the expansion of (a + b)4 has five terms and in each term the sum
of the indices is 4.
We conclude that the expansion of (a + b)n has n + 1 terms and in
each term the sum of the indices is n.
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 0
A look at Pascal s triangle

The coefficients of the terms follow an interesting pattern.

How can we determine this pattern and how can we predict the
coefficients of the expansion of (a + b)n ?
The binomial theorem gives us the general formula for the
expansion of (a + b)n for any positive integer n.
The binomial theorem also enables us to determine the coefficient
of any particular term of an expansion of (a + b)n
The coefficients of the expansion of (a + b)n for a particular
positive integer n, are contained in sequence in the nth row of the
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Pascal s triangle of numbers.

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 0
A look at Pascal s triangle

Consider the expansion of (1 + x)n for n = 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.

(1 + x)0 = 1
(1 + x)1 = 1 + x
(1 + x)2 = 1 + 2x + x 2
(1 + x)3 = 1 + 3x + 3x 2 + x 3
(1 + x)4 = 1 + 4x + 6x 2 + 4x 3 + x 4
(1 + x)5 = 1 + 5x + 10x 2 + 10x 3 + 5x 4 + x 5

When the coefficients in the expansions of (1 + x)n are arranged

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in a table, the result is known as Pascal s triangle.
We can use Pascalâs triangle to help us expand expressions of
the form (1 + x)n .

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 0
A look at Pascal s triangle

Example
Expand 1. (1 + x)6 2. (1 2x)6

Solution
1. The coefficients of (1 + x)6 are given in the sixth row of Pascal s
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triangle:

(1 + x)6 = 1 + 6x + 15x 2 + 20x 3 + 15x 4 + 6x 5 + x 6 . (1)

2. Replacing 2x for x in the expansion of (1 + x)6

(1 + x)6 = 1 + 6( 2x) + 15( 2x)2 + 20( 2x)3

+ 15( 2x)4 + 6( 2x)5 + ( 2x)6
=1 12x + 60x 2 160x 3 + 240x 4 192x 5 + 64x 6 .

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Expanding Binomials

Expansions (multiplying several binomials)

Consider the two binomials

(a + b)(c + d) = a(c + d) + b(c + d) = ac + ad + bc + bd.

The expansion is obtained by multiplying each letter in the first bracket

by each letter in the second and adding them.
There are 2 ⇥ 2 = 22 = 4 terms.

Similarly, with three binomials, we have

(a+b)(c +d)(e+f ) = ace+acf +ade+adf +bce+bcf +bde+bdf . (2)

There are 2 ⇥ 2 ⇥ 2 = 23 = 8 terms.

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Expanding Binomials

Exercise
(a) How many terms are there in the expansion of

(a + b + c)(d + e)?

(b) How many terms are there in the expansion of

(a + b)(c + d)(e + f )(g + h)(i + j)?

Remark

In general, the product of any number of polynomials is equal to the

sum of all the products which can be formed by choosing one term
from each polynomial and multiplying these terms together.

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Expansions and the notation n cr

Example
Find the coefficient of x 2 in the expansion of (2x 1)(3x + 4)(5x 6).

Solution
take the terms containing x from any two of the factors and the
constant from the remaining factor.
multiply them together to obtain a term containing x 2 in the
expansion.
do this in all possible ways and add them to find the required
coefficient.
The required coefficient is

2 ⇥ 3 ⇥ ( 6) + 3 ⇥ 5 ⇥ ( 1) + 2 ⇥ 5 ⇥ 4 = 36 15 + 40 = 11.

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Permutations and Combinations

A permutation is an arrangement of elements chosen from a set.

Example
consider the set {a, b, c, d, e}. Some of the permutations of 3letters
taken from this set include

abc, bac, cab, eda.

Altogether, there are 5 ⇥ 4 ⇥ 3 = 60 such permutations.

Definition
The number of permutations of r distinct objects chosen from n objects
is denoted by, n Pr and defined by

n n!
Pr = n(n 1) · · · n r +1= .
n r!

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Permutations and Combinations

Example
List all the permutations of the letters in the word CAT .

Solution There are 3 ⇥ 2 ⇥ 1 = 6 such permutations:

CAT , CTA, TAC, TCA, ACT , ATC.

Example
Seven runners are competing in a race. In how many ways can the
gold, silver and bronze medals be awarded?

Solution
The gold medal can be awarded in 7 ways. The silver medal can then
be awarded in 6 ways. The bronze medal can then be awarded in 5
ways.
The total number of ways of awarding the medals is 7 ⇥ 6 ⇥ 5 = 210
ways.
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Permutations and Combinations

Definition
The number of ways of choosing r objects from n objects is denoted by
n C and is defined by
r

nP n!
n r
Cr = =
r! (n r )!r !

Example
In how many ways can you choose two people from a group of seven
people?

Solution
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There are 7 C2 = 2 = 21 ways of choosing two people from seven.

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Permutations and Combinations

Example
There are ten people in a basketball squad. Find how may ways the
starting five can be chosen from the squad:

Solution
There are 10 C5 = 10 ⇥ 9 ⇥ 8 ⇥ 7 ⇥ 65 ⇥ 4 ⇥ 3 ⇥ 2 ⇥ 1 = 252 ways of
choosing the starting five.

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The binomial theorem

Definition
For each positive integer n,

(a + b)n = an +n C1 an 1
b +n C2 an 2 2
b + · · · + nCn 1 ab
n 1
+ bn .

The binomial theorem can also be stated using summation notation:

n
X
n n
(a + b) = Cr an r br .
r =1

Substituting with a = 1 and b = x gives

(1 + x)n =n C0 +n C1 x +n C2 x 2 + · · · +n Cr x r + · · · +n Cn r x n r
+n Cn x n .

The number n Cr is called the binomial coefficient.

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The Binomial Theorem

Example
Use the binomial theorem to find the coefficients in the expansion
(a + b)7

Solution
The coefficients are
! ! ! ! ! !
7 7 7 7 7 7
1, , , , , , , 1
1 2 3 4 5 6

The coefficients are 1, 7, 21, 35, 35, 21, 71 and 1.

!
nC n
Note: r =
r

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The Binomial Theorem

Remark

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Pascal s triangle is the easier and quicker way of finding
coefficients provided n is not too large.
If n is large or not known, then the Binomial theorem must be
used.
The theorem is essential in more advanced work when n may not
be a positive integer.

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The Binomial Theorem

Example
Find the first four terms in the expansion (x 2)12

Solution
Let a = x, b = 2 and n = 12. The first four terms are
! ! !
12 12 12
x 12 + 11
x ( 2) + 10
x ( 2) + 2
x 9 ( 2)3
1 2 3

12 ⇥ 11 10 12 ⇥ 11 ⇥ 10 9
= x 12 + 12x 11 ( 2) + x (4) + x ( 8)
1⇥2 1⇥2⇥3

= x 12 24x 11 + 264x 10 1760x 9

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The Binomial Theorem

Class Exercise

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1. Find the 5th and 6th terms in the expansion (2x 2) .
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2. Find the term independent of x in the expansion (2x x) .

3. ’Find in ascending powers of x, the first four terms in the expansion

(a) (1 3x)5 (b) (1 + 5x)7 .

Hence find the coefficient of x 2 in the expansion of (1 3x)5 (1 + 5x)7 .

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