Scott Ripley
Posted on Thursday, 10 July, 2003 - 09:46 am:

I am given that zn+1/zn=2cosnq, for n a positive integer, and z=cisq. I am supposed to show that 4cos3q = cos3q+ 3cosq.

In part (a) of this question I was to show that (z+1/z)3=(z3+1/z3)+(3z+3/z) which I showed easily. I'm supposed to use the result from (a) to show that 4cos3q = cos3q+3cos q but I don't know how.

I know that 4cos3q = 2(2cosnq) so that is in my mind but from there I get stuck. I try substituting cisq into the large equation above but I can't find any things to cancel out to ultimately get just cos.

Andre Rzym
Posted on Thursday, 10 July, 2003 - 10:10 am:

You are almost there. Firstly, you mean

z=cos(q)+isin(q)

and we are to prove

4cos3q = ...

Now focus on each term of your identity:

(z+1/z)3=(z3+1/z3)+(3z+3/z)

Now we know

(z+1/z)=2cos(q)

So

8cos3(q)=(z3+1/z3)+(3z+3/z)

Can you carry on from here?

Andre

Scott Ripley
Posted on Thursday, 10 July, 2003 - 10:37 am:

I understood how you got 8cos3(q)=(z3+ 1/z3)+(3z+3/z) but from there I'm just stuck again. I tried substituting cisq into (z3+1/z3)+(3z+3/z) but once again nothing. I thought that if 8cos3(q)=(z3+1/z3)+ (3z+3/z) then if I divided it by two it would give me 4cos3(q) which is what I require, but then I don't know how dividing all the cos and sin parts by 2 would do any good. Is there something I'm missing here?
Andre Rzym
Posted on Thursday, 10 July, 2003 - 11:02 am:

Now focus on the (3z+3/z) term. We can rewrite this as 3(z+1/z). But from your very first statement, what does z+1/z equal?

This leaves the z3+1/z3 term. For this, note that z3=cos(3q)+isin(3q). What, therefore, does 1/z3 equal? What, therefore, does z3+ 1/z3 equal?

Andre

Scott Ripley
Posted on Thursday, 10 July, 2003 - 12:44 pm:

Oh i got it now, thanks a bunch