Applied Mathematics and Computation 218 (2011) 88–95

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Applied Mathematics and Computation

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/amc

A comparison between iterative methods by using the basins of attraction

Gheorghe Ardelean
North University of Baia Mare, Department of Mathematics and Computer Science, Victoriei 76, 430122 Baia Mare, Romania

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Keywords: There exists a real competition between authors to construct improved iterative methods
Newton’s method for solving nonlinear equations. In this paper, by using computer experiment, we study the
Iterative methods basins of attraction for some of the iterative methods for solving the equation P(z) = 0,
Order of convergence where P : C ! C is a complex coefficients polynomial, and this allows us to compare their
Efficiency index
performances (the area of convergence and theirs speed). The beauty fractal pictures gen-
Basin of attraction
erated by these methods are presented too.
Ó 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction

Let f be a function f : R ! R and a a root of the equation f(x) = 0, that is f(a) = 0. It is known that if f0 (a) – 0, x0 is suffi-
ciently close to a and under some conditions, the classical Newton’s method defined by
f ðxn Þ
xnþ1 ¼ xn  n ¼ 0; 1; 2; . . . ð1Þ
f 0 ðxn Þ
generates a sequence fxn g1
n¼0 that converges to a.
The mapping
f ðxÞ
UðxÞ ¼ x  ð2Þ
f 0 ðxÞ
is called the Iteration function (abrev. I. F.) [17] of the method defined by (1).
It is known that Newton’s method converges quadratically in a sufficiently small neighborhood of the root a.
To increase the order of convergence of the iterative methods for solving nonlinear equations, many authors developed
new methods [2,3,6,8,10,11,13,19]. Other papers generating the basins of attraction are [1,4,7,12,14,15,18]. A very good
monograf on numerical analysis is [5].
In this paper we present the results obtained by computer experiments for some of these improved methods applied to
complex polynomial equations.

2. Fundamental concepts and description of the methods

Order of convergence [17].

Let fxn g1
n¼0 be a sequence converging to a. Let ei = xi  a. If three exists a real number p and a nonzero constantC such that
jenþ1 j
!C ð3Þ
jen jp

E-mail address: ardelean_g@yahoo.com

0096-3003/$ - see front matter Ó 2011 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.amc.2011.05.055
 G. Ardelean / Applied Mathematics and Computation 218 (2011) 88–95 89

then p is called order of the sequence and C is called the asymptotic error constant.
If the sequence fxn g1
n¼0 is generated by an I. F. of an iterative method

xnþ1 ¼ Uðxn Þ; n ¼ 0; 1; 2; . . . ð4Þ

then p is called the order of I. F. (and of the corresponding method too).

Efficiency index [17].
Let U be an I. F. A piece of information is any evaluation of a function or one of its derivatives. The informational usage d
of I. F. is the number of new pieces of information required per iteration. The efficiency index of U (and of the corresponding
method) is

1
Ei ¼ pd ; ð5Þ

where p is the order of U and d is the informational usage.

Basin of attraction [9]
Let P : C ! C be a complex polynomial of degree at least two, and let a be one of its zeros. If z0 2 C is a starting point for
the Newton’s method defined by

Pðzn Þ
znþ1 ¼ zn  n ¼ 0; 1; 2; . . . ð6Þ
P0 ðzn Þ

then the sequence fzn g1

n¼0 converges, or not, to a zero of P. If the sequence converges to a then we say that z0 is attracted to a.

Arthur Cayley in ‘‘The Newton–Fourier imaginary problem’’ (1879) recognized that if we know the roots of a function,
Newton’s method suggests another problem: which starting point to which roots and what about the staring points for
which Newton’s iteration does not converge. Gaston Julia gives the answer to the question (1918). The basin of attraction
corresponding to a zero a of the polynomial P is the set of all starting points z0 which are attracted to a.
In our study we investigate six iterative Newton-type methods and we present the results obtained for three complex
polynomial equations.
The methods are:

(a) Classical Newton’s method (CN).

The method is defined by the relation (6). It is well known that this method is quadratically convergent and of effi-
1
ciency index 22 ¼ 1:414.
(b) Arithmetic mean Newton’s method (AN) [19]
This method is defined by

2Pðzn Þ
znþ1 ¼ zn  ; n ¼ 0; 1; 2; . . . ; ð7Þ
P0 ðzn Þ þ P0 ðyn Þ
1
where yn ¼ zn  PPðz
0
nÞ
ðzn Þ
. The method is third-order of convergence and is of efficiency index 33 ¼ 1:442.

Fig. 1. Gridpoints of the rectangle D (480  480 points).

90 G. Ardelean / Applied Mathematics and Computation 218 (2011) 88–95

Fig. 2. The basins of attraction for the roots of the polynomial P1(z).

(c) Harmonic mean Newton’s method (HN) [13]

The method is defined by
Pðzn ÞðP0 ðzn Þ þ P0 ðyn ÞÞ
znþ1 ¼ zn  n ¼ 0; 1; 2; . . . ð8Þ
2P0 ðzn ÞP0 ðyn Þ
1
where yn ¼ zn  PPðz
0
nÞ
ðzn Þ
. This method is third-order of convergence and efficiency index is 33 ¼ 1:442.
 G. Ardelean / Applied Mathematics and Computation 218 (2011) 88–95 91

Fig. 3. The basins of attraction for the roots of the polynomial P2(z).

(d) Midpoint Newton’s method (MN) [13]

The method is defined by
Pðzn Þ
znþ1 ¼ zn  n ¼ 0; 1; 2; . . . ; ð9Þ
P0 ððzn þ yn Þ=2Þ
92 G. Ardelean / Applied Mathematics and Computation 218 (2011) 88–95

Fig. 4. The basins of attraction for the roots of the polynomial P3(z).

Pðzn Þ
where yn ¼ zn  P 0 ðzn Þ
.
1
This method is third-order of convergence and of efficiency index 33 ¼ 1:442 too.
(e) Halley’s method (HM) [17]
This method is defined by
 G. Ardelean / Applied Mathematics and Computation 218 (2011) 88–95 93

Fig. 5. Computer time needed to generate the basins of attraction (Newton = 1).

Fig. 6. Mean number of iterations for convergent points.

!
1 LP ðzn Þ Pðzn Þ
znþ1 ¼ zn  1 þ ; n ¼ 0; 1; 2; . . . ; ð10Þ
2 1  12 LP ðzn Þ P0 ðzn Þ
00
where LP ðzn Þ ¼ P ½Pðz0 ðz
n ÞPðzn Þ
Þ2
.
n
1
This method is third-order of convergence and of efficiency index 33 ¼ 1:442.
(f) Traub–Ostrowski method (TOM) [17]
The method is defined by

Pðyn Þ  Pðzn Þ Pðzn Þ

znþ1 ¼ zn  n ¼ 0; 1; 2; . . . ð11Þ
2Pðyn Þ  Pðzn Þ P0 ðzn Þ
where yn ¼ zn  PPðz
0
nÞ
ðzn Þ
.
1
This method is of fourth-order of convergence and of efficiency index 43 ¼ 1:587.
By Kung–Traub Conjecture, a method has the optimal order equals to 2d1 and optimal efficiency index equals to 2(d1)/d,
where d is the informational usage. So, this method has optimal order 4 = 231 (in this case d = 3) and optimal efficiency in-
1 2
dex 43 ¼ 23 .
94 G. Ardelean / Applied Mathematics and Computation 218 (2011) 88–95

The test polynomials used in our computer experiments are as follows:

(1) P1(z) = z7  1 whose zeros are: 1, 0.623 ± 0.782i,  0.223 ± 0.975i, 0.901 ± 0.434i. This example is like in [16].
(2) P2(z) = z8 + (1 + 8i)z7 + (22 + 27i)z6 + (105 + 70i)z5 + ( 271 + 185i)z4 + (346 + 872i)z3 + (1282 + 1658i)z2 +
(3060  2820i)z  3600. The zeros are: 1, 1 + i, 2i, 2 + 2i, 3, 3  3i,  5i, 5  5i (in a ‘‘spiral’’ placement that can
be seen in Fig. 3. This example is from [6].
(3) P3(z) = z3 + (2  3i)z2  (5 + 5i)z  8  12i with zeros: 3 + 2i,  1  i, 2 + 2i.

3. Fractal pictures for the basins of attraction

To generate the basins of attraction for the zeros of a polynomial and an iterative method we take a rectangle D  C and a
grid points system covering D, like in Fig. 1.
In our numerical experiments, we take a grid of 480  480 points in D and we apply the iterative method starting in every
z0 2 D. If the sequence generated by iterative method attempt a zero a of the polynomial with a tolerance e = 105 and a
maximum of 14 iterations, we decide that z0 is in the basin of attraction of these zero and we can mark this point with a
color associated to these zero, like in Fig. 1. We mark with white the points z0 2 D for which the corresponding iterative
method starting in z0 does not reach any zero of the polynomial, with tolerance e = 105 in a maximum of 14 iterations.
In practice, if the iterative method starting in z0 2 D reach a zero in k iterations (k < 15), then we mark this point z0 with a
color depending on k. For example, for k = 14 the associated color is red. For our polynomials P1(z), P2(z) and P3(z) we take the
rectangles D1, D2 and respectively D3 as follows: D1 = [2, 2]  [2, 2]; D2 = [15, 20]  [20, 15]; D3 = [300, 300]  [300,
300]. In each of these cases, the rectangle contains all zeros of corresponding polynomial. To generate the pictures we em-
ployed Mathcad 14.0 and a computer laptop DELL Inspiron 1501, 1.6 GHz.
For the basins of attraction the following Figs. 2–4 was obtained:

4. Numerical results

The results of our computer experiments are presented in three suggestive diagrams (in Figs. 5–7), that concentrate all
informations concerning the behaviour of the investigated methods on the three example polynomials P1, P2 and P3.
In them, the methods are identified as follows:

CN – classical Newton’s method

AN – arithmetic mean Newton’s method
HN – Harmonic mean Newton’s method
MN – midpoint Newton’s method
HM – Halley’s method
TOM – Traub–Ostrowski’s method

Fig. 7. Number of convergent poins/ Total number of starting points evaluated.

 G. Ardelean / Applied Mathematics and Computation 218 (2011) 88–95 95

We think that the most relevant and important results are those in the diagram from Fig. 5 which show the computer
time needed by each method to generate the basins of attraction for each polynomial P1, P2 and P3.
This time is presented as a relative time to Newton’s method, to not depend on the computer used.
The absolute values of time for Newton’s method, on our computer was:
220 s for the polynomial P1; 332 s for the polynomial P2; 206 s for the polynomial P3.

5. Conclusions

In each of shown diagrams, we included for each method a green bar corresponding to the mean of values presented for
the three polynomials P1, P2 and P3. This shows us that ‘‘the best’’ from all points of view is Traub–Ostrowski’s method
(TOM). It’s normally, because this method has the greatest efficiency index, that is 1.587, and is an optimal efficiency index.
We observe too that this method is only of fourth-order between the methods investigated.
About the methods of third-order (AN, HN, MN and HM) we consider that Halley’s method (HM) to be the best of this
group (is the best as the time parameter and percentage of convergent points). The Arithmetic mean Newton’s method
(AN) seems to be ‘‘the last’’ from all points of view.
We specify that classical Newton’s method (CN) is not included in the ‘‘competition’’. This is only used as a standard.

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