Graphs of functions

BMS

1 Functions
A few odds and ends on functions:

1.1 Some definitions

• A function from D to R is a rule such that for every x ∈ D, there is a unique point
y ∈ R such that y = f (x)

Here D is the domain (’the numbers you can put it’) and R is the range
(’the numbers you get out’)

•A function is even if f (x) = f (−x) for all x ∈ R.

Geometrically, this means the function has reflective symmetry in the y-axis.

•A function is odd if f (x) = −f (−x) for all x ∈ R.

Geometrically, this means the function has rotational symmetry of order 2 about the origin.

•A function is increasing if for all a, b ∈ D with a < b, we have f (a) ≤ f (b)

(or equivalently f 0 (x) ≥ 0 for all x ∈ D)

•A function is strictly increasing if for all a, b ∈ D with a < b, we have f (a) < f (b)
(or equivalently f 0 (x) > 0 for all x ∈ D)

•A function is decreasing if for all a, b ∈ D with a < b, we have f (a) ≥ f (b)

(or equivalently f 0 (x) ≤ 0 for all x ∈ D)

•A function is strictly dereasing if for all a, b ∈ D with a < b, we have f (a) > f (b)
(or equivalently f 0 (x) < 0 for all x ∈ D)

You met functions in C3. The definitions for increasing/decreasing etc are new(ish) but
fairly obvious.

Notation
We sometimes write f : D → R to indicate the domain and range of a function.

For example, f : R → R, f (x) = ex

Examples
1
1. f (x) = x
with D = R is not a function (it is not defined for x = 0)

1
2. f (x) = x
with D = R\{0} is a function

Notation: R\{0} means all the real numbers not including zero.

3. f (x) = ex is a strictly increasing function.

4. f (x) = cos x and g(x) = x2 are both examples of even functions.

5. f (x) = sin x and g(x) = x3 are both examples of odd functions.

6. f (x) = x2 is a strictly increasing function for x ≥ 0.

1.2 Finding maxima and minima of functions in an interval

You already know how to find turning points of functions.

The process of finding the maximum/minimum value attained by a function

in an interval (and this is the key difference to just finding turning points) is:

• Find x coordinates of turning points as normal.

• Evaluate function at turning points.
• Check the value of the function at the end points.

It is very important to remember to check end points if you are given an interval as
these examples demonstrate.
Examples
1. Find the biggest and smallest value taken by f (x) = x3 − x on the interval [−1, 1]

Differentiating, we have f 0 (x) = 3x2 − 1 so that setting this equal to 0 tells us that
the turning points are when x = ± √13

Now f ( √13 ) = − 3√2 3 and f (− √13 ) = 2

√
3 3

Evidently x = √13 gives us a minimum turning point and x = − √13 gives us a

maximum turning point. If we hadn’t drawn the function, we could always take the
second derivative to determine this.

Now checking the end points we find f (1) = f (−1) = 0.

Hence, on the interval [−1, 1], the biggest and smallest values taken by f (x)
correspond to the turning points.

2. Suppose we now had the same question as in 1 but over the interval [−2, 2]

Evaluating the function at the end points we get

f (2) = 6 f (−2) = −6

These are the maximum and minimum value attained by the function respectively
on the interval we are interested in. (We’ve already done the turning points before!)
These are called boundary maxima/minima for obvious reasons.

This stresses the importance of always checking the end points. Neither x = 2 or
x = −2 correspond to turning points but; because of the interval we have used, they
turn out to correspond to the maximum/minimum value attained by the function on
the interval.
3. Given the function f (x) = x3 − 3x2 + 2x + 3 and g(x) = x2 − 3x − 4, find the values
of x between 0.8 and 1.8 which give the maximum and minimum difference between
f (x) and g(x).

We want to maximimse/minimise the difference between f (x) and g(x).

Define the difference between f (x) and g(x) as h(x) = f (x) − g(x).

Then
h(x) = x3 − 4x2 + 5x + 7
so
h0 (x) = 3x2 − 8x + 5
Solving
h0 (x) = 3x2 − 6x + 5 = 0 ⇒ h0 (x) = (3x − 5)(x − 1) = 0
so that
5
x= or x = 1
3
Evaluating the difference function at these points we get
 
5 23
h =8 or h(1) = 9
3 27
so that the maximum difference occurs when x = 1 and the minimum difference
occurs when x = 53 .

Of course, we could also find h00 (x) = 6x − 8 and evaluate this when x = 1 and
x = 53 to verify that they are indeed maxima and minima respectively.
We also need to check the end points so find h(0.8) and h(1.8); they fall inbetween
these two values.
2 Graphs
2.1 Important graphs to know
You should be very familiar with the following graphs:

• All the trig functions

• Basic graphs involving the modulus function
• Any polynomial
• ax for the
√ cases 0 < a < 1, a = 1 and a > 1
• f (x) = x
• Log graphs

2.2 Graphical Transformations

You should also be very familiar with the following:

Suppose I have sketched the graph of y = f (x). Then

• y = f (ax) stretches the graph horizontally by a scale factor of a1 .

• y = af (x) stretches the graph vertically by a scale factor of a.

• y = f (x − a) shifts the graph a units to the right.

• y = f (x) + a shifts the entire graph up a units.

• y = |f (x)| reflects any ’stuff’ below the x-axis, above it.

• y = f (|x|) has no effect on the graph for any points with x ≥ 0 (since in this case
|x| = x). It then reflects this ’stuff’ in the y-axis (replacing any ’stuff’ that was previously
to the left of the y-axis/had a negative x coordinate)
Examples
 π 
1. Sketch the graph of the function y = cos (x − 2) 
 
6
You just need to build you way up in any problem like this.
Start with y = f (x) = cos x

Then f (x − 2) = cos (x − 2) is a shift by 2 to the right

So f ( π6 (x − 2)) is a stretch of this, scale factor 6

π

so finally we end up at the required graph on taking the absolute value:

2. A graph of the function y = f (x), −2 ≤ x ≤ 0 is pictured below.

Sketch the graph of y = f (x2 + 1)

This doesn’t look like any of the transformations above. That’s OK because the
function is simple enough so we can tackle it algebraically.

We can see that (

x+2 − 2 ≤ x ≤ −1
f (x) =
−x 1≤x≤0
so that (
x2 + 2 − 2 ≤ x ≤ −1
f (x2 ) =
−x2 1≤x≤0
which we can sketch

This is still a function (It is just no longer a continuous function). You would now
sketch f (x2 + 1) by shifting this stuff 1 unit to the left.
2.3 A good checklist
Suppose you are asked to draw a graph which you are unfamiliar with. A good checklist
to run through in your mind is:

• What happens when x = 0?

• Where does the graph intercept the axes?
• What happens as x → ±∞?
• Does the curve have any turning points? What type?
• Are you ever dividing by zero?
• Asymptotes? (Please see below!)
• Is the function even or odd?

2.4 Finding asymptotes

There are three types of asymptotes:

• Vertical asymptotes
You get vertical asympototes when you would be dividing by zero.

• Horizontal asymptotes
Horizontal asymptotes show the value that the graph approaches as x gets either very big
or small.

Example
1
Consider f (x) = , x 6= −2. This has a vertical asymptote x = −2.
x+2
What happens when x get very large? We see that f (x) gets very close to 0
(it approaches 0 from above when x tends to positive infinity and it approaches 0 from
below when x tends to negative infinity). Hence y = 0 is a horizontal asymptote.

• Oblique asymptotes
Sometimes, a function can tend towards/approach a line which we can find the equation of.

To find an oblique asymptote, you rewrite the function using polynomial long division
and then think what happens as x gets big.
P (x)
Note that if you have a rational function f (x) = Q(x) where P (x) and Q(x) are
polynomials (this is the only case you would need to find oblique asymptotes in) that we
only obtain an oblique asymptote when the degree of P (x) is greater than Q(x)

Example
x2 + 1
If we wanted to find the oblique asymptote of f (x) = , x 6= 1 we note that
x−1
2
f (x) = x + 1 + so that when x gets large, the fraction is negligible.
x−1
Thus f (x) has the line y = x + 1 as an oblique asymptote.
Example
2x(x2 − 5)
Sketch the graph of the function y = , x 6= ±2
x2 − 4
• When x = 0, y = 0.
√
• The curve cuts the x-axis when y = 0. This gives us x = 0, x = ± 5.

• The denominator is zero when x = ±2. These are our vertical asymptotes.

• What happens as x gets very close to 2 (and -2) from both above and below? (i.e.
think what happens if you put 1.9 or 2.1 in the equation)
For example, if we put 1.9 in the equation we see that the answer we get is positive and
if we put 2.1 in, we get a negative answer. This helps us determine the shape of the graph.

• If you take the derivative and set it equal to 0, you will find that there are no turning
points.

• When x gets very large (tends to infinity), so does y. When x gets very
negative (tends to negative infinity), so does y.

• Using polynomial long division,

2x(x2 − 5) 2x
y= 2
= 2x − 2
x −4 x −4
2x
so that when x gets very big or very negative, the x2 −4
is negligible so we have y = 2x as
an oblique asymptote.

• Also notice the function is odd so will have rotational symmertry about the origin.

Note that computers/calculators will often draw in the vertical asymptotes as thick lines
as shown here. The lines x = ±2 should be dotted (as should the oblique asymptote
y = 2x which I have put in red for effect)
3 Further investigation and suggested reading
Some suggested topics to Google/investigate are:
• Conic sections (We will look at and study these next term)
• The modulus function
• Algebraic curves
• Solving inequalities graphically (see FP2)

Some further reading:

• Wikipedia: Maxima and Minima
Introduces the idea of global/local maxima/minima etc
• Plane Algebraic Curves, Gerd Fischer (Chapter 0)
Available from me.
• http://www.mathcentre.ac.uk/resources/uploaded/mc-ty-composite-2009-1.pdf
Composition of functions
• http://www.geom.uiuc.edu/docs/reference/CRC-formulas/node33.html
Some more on algebraic curves.