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In mathematics, a Riemann sum is a certain kind of approximation of an integral by a finite sum. It is named after nineteenth century German mathematician Bernhard Riemann . One very common application is in numerical integration , i.e., approximating the area of functions or lines on a graph, where it is also known as the rectangle rule .
One popular restriction is the use of "left-hand" and "right-hand" Riemann sums. In a left-hand Riemann sum, t i = x i for all i, and in a right-hand Riemann sum, t i = x i + 1 for all i. Alone this restriction does not impose a problem: we can refine any partition in a way that makes it a left-hand or right-hand sum by subdividing it at each t i.
In calculus, the trapezoidal rule (also known as the trapezoid rule or trapezium rule) [a] is a technique for numerical integration, i.e., approximating the definite integral: (). The trapezoidal rule works by approximating the region under the graph of the function f ( x ) {\displaystyle f(x)} as a trapezoid and calculating its area.
A converging sequence of Riemann sums. The number in the upper left is the total area of the blue rectangles. They converge to the definite integral of the function. We are describing the area of a rectangle, with the width times the height, and we are adding the areas together.
The harmonic number H n can be interpreted as a Riemann sum of the integral: + = (+). The n th harmonic number is about as large as the natural logarithm of n . The reason is that the sum is approximated by the integral ∫ 1 n 1 x d x , {\displaystyle \int _{1}^{n}{\frac {1}{x}}\,dx,} whose value is ln n .
A quadrature rule is an approximation of the definite integral of a function, usually stated as a weighted sum of function values at specified points within the domain of integration. Numerical integration methods can generally be described as combining evaluations of the integrand to get an approximation to the integral.
Example of a domain transformation from cartesian to polar. Example 2c. The domain is D = {x 2 + y 2 ≤ 4}, that is a circumference of radius 2; it's evident that the covered angle is the circle angle, so φ varies from 0 to 2 π, while the crown radius varies from 0 to 2 (the crown with the inside radius null is just a circle). Example 2d.
For a sufficiently large , the expression in the square brackets is a Riemann sum approximation to the integral (more precisely, it is a midpoint rule approximation with spacing ). Since the sinc function is continuous, this approximation converges to the integral as N → ∞ {\displaystyle N\to \infty } .