Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
The phrase "linear equation" takes its origin in this correspondence between lines and equations: a linear equation in two variables is an equation whose solutions form a line. If b ≠ 0, the line is the graph of the function of x that has been defined in the preceding section. If b = 0, the line is a vertical line (that is a line parallel to ...
Quadratic equation. In mathematics, a quadratic equation (from Latin quadratus ' square ') is an equation that can be rearranged in standard form as [ 1] where x represents an unknown value, and a, b, and c represent known numbers, where a ≠ 0. (If a = 0 and b ≠ 0 then the equation is linear, not quadratic.)
Wave equation. The wave equation is a second-order linear partial differential equation for the description of waves or standing wave fields such as mechanical waves (e.g. water waves, sound waves and seismic waves) or electromagnetic waves (including light waves). It arises in fields like acoustics, electromagnetism, and fluid dynamics.
Using this form, vertical lines correspond to equations with b = 0. One can further suppose either c = 1 or c = 0, by dividing everything by c if it is not zero. There are many variant ways to write the equation of a line which can all be converted from one to another by algebraic manipulation. The above form is sometimes called the standard form.
Catenary. A chain hanging from points forms a catenary. Freely-hanging overhead power lines also form a catenary (most prominently visible with high-voltage lines, and with some imperfection near to the insulators ). The silk on a spider's web forming multiple elastic catenaries. In physics and geometry, a catenary ( US: / ˈkætənɛri / KAT ...
Quadratic formula. The roots of the quadratic function y = 1 2 x2 − 3x + 5 2 are the places where the graph intersects the x -axis, the values x = 1 and x = 5. They can be found via the quadratic formula. In elementary algebra, the quadratic formula is a closed-form expression describing the solutions of a quadratic equation.
An ellipsoid is a surface that can be obtained from a sphere by deforming it by means of directional scalings, or more generally, of an affine transformation . An ellipsoid is a quadric surface ; that is, a surface that may be defined as the zero set of a polynomial of degree two in three variables. Among quadric surfaces, an ellipsoid is ...
The solutions of this equation are the x-values of the critical points and are given, using the quadratic formula, by =. The sign of the expression Δ 0 = b 2 – 3ac inside the square root 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.