When we calculate average rate of change of a function over a given interval, we’re calculating the average number of units that the function moves up or down, per unit along the x-axis. Which means we always need to define a particular interval over which we’ll calculate the average rate of change of the function.
Read MoreWe can tell by now that these derivative rules are very often used together. We’ve seen power rule used together with both product rule and quotient rule, and we’ve seen chain rule used with power rule. In this lesson, we want to focus on using chain rule with product rule. But these chain rule/product rule problems are going to require power rule, too.
Read MoreAt every point along a function, the function has a slope that we can calculate. If our function is a straight line, it’ll have the same slope at every point. But for any function that isn’t a straight line, the slope of the function will change as the value of the function changes. To find the slope of a function at a particular point, we can take the derivative of the function, and then evaluate it at the point we’re interested in. Doing that gives us the slope of the function at the point, but also the slope of the tangent line to the function at that point.
Read MoreGrowth and decay problems are another common application of derivatives. We actually don’t need to use derivatives in order to solve these problems, but derivatives are used to build the basic growth and decay formulas, which is why we study these applications in this part of calculus.
Read MoreWe’ve learned about the basic derivative rules, including chain rule, and now we want to shift our attention toward the derivatives of specific kinds of functions. In this section we’ll be looking at the derivatives of trigonometric functions, and later on we’ll look at the derivatives of exponential and logarithmic functions.
Read MoreThe Mean Value Theorem tells us that, as long as the function is continuous (unbroken) and differentiable (smooth) everywhere inside the interval we’ve chosen, then there must be a line tangent to the curve somewhere in the interval, which is parallel to this line we’ve just drawn that connects the endpoints.
Read MoreChain rule is also often used with quotient rule. In other words, we always use the quotient rule to take the derivative of rational functions, but sometimes we’ll need to apply chain rule as well when parts of that rational function require it. Let’s look at an example of how these two derivative rules would be used together.
Read MoreFortunately, the derivatives of the hyperbolic functions are really similar to the derivatives of trig functions, so they’ll be pretty easy for us to remember. We only see a difference between the two when it comes to the derivative of cosine vs. the derivative of hyperbolic cosine.
Read MoreLinear approximation is a useful tool because it allows us to estimate values on a curved graph (difficult to calculate), using values on a line (easy to calculate) that happens to be close by. If we want to calculate the value of the curved graph at a particular point, but we don’t know the equation of the curved graph, we can draw a line that’s tangent to the curved graph at the point we’re interested in. Remember that “tangent to the graph” means that the line barely skims the graph and touches it at only one point.
Read MoreRemember that we’ll use implicit differentiation to take the first derivative, and then use implicit differentiation again to take the derivative of the first derivative to find the second derivative. Once we have an equation for the second derivative, we can always make a substitution for y, since we already found y' when we found the first derivative.
Read MoreThe chain rule is often one of the hardest concepts for calculus students to understand. It’s also one of the most important, and it’s used all the time, so make sure you don’t leave this section without a solid understanding.
Read MoreThe derivatives of base-10 logs and natural logs follow a simple derivative formula that we can use to differentiate them. With derivatives of logarithmic functions, it’s always important to apply chain rule and multiply by the derivative of the log’s argument.
Read MoreTo find the equation of the tangent line using implicit differentiation, follow three steps. First differentiate implicitly, then plug in the point of tangency to find the slope, then put the slope and the tangent point into the point-slope formula.
Read MoreGiven that the numerator is a constant and the denominator is any function, the derivative will be the negative constant, multiplied by the derivative of the denominator divided by the square of the denominator.
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