MATH1020U: Chapter 6 cont… 1

POWER SERIES cont…

Taylor and Maclaurin Series and Working with Taylor Series

(Sections 6.3/6.4; Book 2) cont…
Recall: Last day, we introduced the concept of Taylor series and Maclaurin series and

f n (a)
learned that we can write f ( x) = 
n=0 n!
( x − a)n .

( −1) n 2 n

Example: Given that the Maclaurin series for f ( x ) = cos x is  x , find the
n =0 ( 2 n ) !
series expansion for f ( x ) = cos( x ) and write out the 1st 4 terms.
2

Maclaurin series:

1st 4 terms:

Finally, let’s use all this new knowledge to help us do some Calculus…these series can
help evaluate or approximate complicated integrals and limits!!!

1 
xn
Example: How would we approximate e
x2
dx ? Hint: Recall that e = .
x

0 n =0 n !
MATH1020U: Chapter 6 cont… 2


ex −1 xn
Example: Find lim . Note: You may use the fact that e =
x
x→0 x n =0 n !

sin( x 3 ) − x 3
Example: Find lim .
x→0 x9

( −1)n 2 n +1
Note: You may use the fact that sin x =  x
n =0 ( 2 n + 1) !
MATH1020U: Chapter 6 cont… 3

Question: How accurate are our approximations?

n
f (i ) (a)
Define the Taylor Polynomial as Tn ( x) = 
i =0 i!
( x − a ) i and the Remainder as


f ( i ) (a )
Rn ( x) = f ( x) − Tn ( x) = 
i = n +1 i!
( x − a) i

Then we have:

Taylor’s Inequality: If f
( n +1)
( x )  M for x − a  d , then the remainder Rn ( x ) of
the Taylor series satisfies the inequality:
M n +1
Rn ( x )  x−a x−a  d
( n + 1)! for
MATH1020U: Chapter 6 cont… 4

1
Example: Find a bound for the remainder obtained when f ( x) = is approximated
x2
using a 3rd degree Taylor polynomial around a = 4 , provided that 3  x  7

x
Example: If we want to approximate e between x = 0 and x = 1 with 0.01 accuracy
using its Maclaurin series expansion, how many terms should we use?