Direction Fields

Prepared by: Katrina E. Belleza, Ph.D.

1 Introduction to Direction Fields

It is in this section that we emphasize the geometric significance of a solution of a first order differential
equation.

Let
y = f (x) or f (x, y) = 0
define a function of x, whose derivatives y exists on an interval I : a < x < b. Then y 0 will give the slope of
0

the graph of this function at each point whose x coordinate is in I.

dy
Recall: the derivative of y with respect to x denoted as y 0 or is interpreted as the change of y with
dx
respect to x or the slope of the tnagent line at every point x.

That is, y 0 will give the direction of the tangent line to the curve at each of these points. Hence when we
are asked to find a 1-parameter family of solutions of

y 0 = F (x, y), a < x < b, (1)

we are actually finding a family of curves, every member of which has at each of its points a slope given by
(1).
Definition 1.1. If y = f (x) or f (x, y) = 0 defines y as a function of x which satisfies (1) on an interval I,
then the graph of this function is called an integral (or solution) curve, i.e., it is the graph of a function
which is a solution of (1).

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Example 1.2. The graph (in blue, red, and green) below shows three integral curves corresponding to the
differential equation y 0 = x2 − x − 2. The solution of this DE is

x3 x2
y= − − 2x + c
3 2
where c is an arbitrary constant. The integral curve is the graph of the solution y of the given differential
equation. Specifically, the curves below correspond to when c = 1 (green), c = 3 (red), and c = 5 (blue)
when substituting to the solution y.

Remark 1.3. Even if we cannot find an elementary function which is a solution of (1), we can by (1) draw
a small line element at any point (x, y) for which x is in I, to represent the slope of an integral curve. Thus,
we may continue in this manner drawing short lines over all that part of the plane for which (1) is valid.

The lines mentioned in Remark 1.3 are called line elements or sometimes lineal elements.. The totality
of such line elements is called a direction (or slope) field.
Example 1.4. Consider the differential equation y 0 = x2 − x − 2 from Example 1.2. When x is substituted
with values, we get different slopes y 0 . These slopes are the corresponding line elements from Remark 1.3.
Plotting these line elements into a plane with respect to x gives us the illustration below as the direction
field of the given differential equation.

These line segments indicate the direction in which a solution (integral) curve is heading, so the direction
field helps us utilize the general shape of these curves.

Example 1.5. Consider the integral curve in Example 1.2 of the corresponding differential equation and its
direction field in Example 1.4. Below is the plot of the direction field (consisting of line elements) seen as a
guide for the direction of the integral curve.

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2 Isoclines
The construction of line elements is unquestionably a tedious job. Moreover, if a sufficient number of them
is not constructed in close proximity, it may be difficult or impossible to choose the correct line element for
the particular integral curve we wish to find. Fortunately, there exists certain aids which can facilitate the
construction of line elements and one of these is to make use of isoclines of a direction field.

If
y 0 = F (x, y), (2)
then the curve for which F (x, y) = k, where k is any number will be an isocline of the direction field
determined by (2).
Example 2.1. Consider the differential equation y 0 = x2 − x − 2 from Example 1.2. Let k = y 0 = −2. That
is setting the slope to −2. Then x = 0 or x = 1. This means that the isocline at x = 0 or x = 1 is of slope
−2. The figure belows shows the following: the line elements at x = 0, 2 of slope −2 (encircled black), the
isoclines at x = 0, 2 of slope −2 (red and green vertical lines), and the integral curve super-imposed on the
isoclines.

dy 2y
Example 2.2. Explore the isoclines of the differential equation = manually or using a slope field
dx x
generator. Solve for the solution of the differential equation and super impose the integral curves on its slope
field.

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