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Rootfinding: The Bisection Method

1. The document discusses three root-finding methods: bisection, Newton's, and secant. 2. Bisection always converges but is slow. Newton's is faster but may not converge. Secant is intermediate in speed and like bisection, always converges, but requires more iterations than Newton's. 3. All three methods are used to find the root of the example equation f(x) = x^6 - x - 1 to demonstrate their application and convergence properties.

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86 views

Rootfinding: The Bisection Method

1. The document discusses three root-finding methods: bisection, Newton's, and secant. 2. Bisection always converges but is slow. Newton's is faster but may not converge. Secant is intermediate in speed and like bisection, always converges, but requires more iterations than Newton's. 3. All three methods are used to find the root of the example equation f(x) = x^6 - x - 1 to demonstrate their application and convergence properties.

Uploaded by

H Aries Oña
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 8

ROOTFINDING

We want to find the numbers x for which f (x) = 0, with f a given


function.

THE BISECTION METHOD:


We assume we are given a function f (x); and in addition, we
assume we have an interval [a, b] containing the root, on which
the function is continuous. We also assume we are given an
error tolerance > 0, and we want an approximate root in [a,
b] for which
-
We further assume the function f (x) changes sign on [a, b],
with
f (a) f (b) < 0

Steps:
Step 1: Define
c = (a + b)
Step 2: If b c , accept c as the root, and then stop.
Step 3: If b c > , then check, compare the sign of f (c) to that
of f (a) and f (b). If sign(f (b)) sign(f (c)) 0 then replace a with
c; and otherwise, replace b with c. Return to Step 1.
Note: Denote the initial interval by [a1, b1], and denote each
successive interval by [aj, bj]. Let cj denote the center of [aj, bj].
Then
- cj bj cj = cj aj = (bj aj)
EXAMPLE: Find the largest root of
f (x) x6 x 1 = 0
accurate to within = 0.001.
SOLN:
It is easy to check that 1 < < 2.
Choose a = 1, b = 2; then f (a) = 1, f (b) = 61. The requirement
f (a) f (b) < 0 is satisfied.
It takes 10 iterations to find the largest root accurate to within
= 0.001 which is 1.1348.
ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES
Advantages:

1. It always converges.

2. You have a guaranteed error bound, and it decreases with each


successive iteration.

3. You have a guaranteed rate of convergence. The error bound


decreases by 12 with each iteration.

Disadvantage:

It is relatively slow when compared with other rootfinding methods,


especially when the function f (x) has several continuous derivatives
about the root .
NEWTONS METHOD:
Newtons method was based on using the line tangent to the
curve of y = f (x), with the point of tangency (x0, f (x0)). When x0
, the graph of the tangent line is approximately the same as
the graph of y = f (x) around x = . We then used the root of the
tangent line to approximate .
For a general equation f (x) = 0, we assume we are given an
initial estimate x0 of the root . The iterates are generated by
the formula

xn+1 = xn [f (xn)/f(xn)], n= 0, 1, 2, ...

EXAMPLE: Solve the equation


f (x) x6 x 1 = 0
for its positive root . An initial guess x0 can be generated from
a graph of y = f (x). The iteration is given by
xn+1 = xn [(xn6 xn 1)/(6xn5 1)], n 0
Use an initial guess of x0 = 1.5.
xn xn1 is an estimate of the error xn1.
From the output, the convergence is very rapid. The iterate x6 is
accurate to the machine precision of around 16 decimal digits.
ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES
Advantages:

1. It is rapidly convergent in most cases.

2. It is simple in its formulation, and therefore relatively easy to apply


and program.

Disadvantage:

1. It may not converge.

2. It is likely to have difficulty if f() = 0. This condition means the x-axis


is tangent to the graph of y = f (x) at x = .

3. It needs to know both f (x) and f(x). Contrast this with the bisection
method which requires only f (x).
THE SECANT METHOD:
Using an approximating line based on interpolation.
We assume we have two estimates of the root , say x0 and x1.
Then we produce a linear function
q(x) = a0 + a1x
with
q(x0) = f (x0), q(x1) = f (x1)
This line is sometimes called a secant line. Its equation is given
by
q(x) = [(x1 x) f (x0) + (x x0) f (x1)] / x1 x0
This is linear in x; and by direction evaluation, it satisfies the
interpolation conditions of q(x0) = f (x0), q(x1) = f (x1).
We now solve the equation q(x) = 0, denoting the root by x2.
This yield
x2 = x1 {f (x1) [f (x1) f (x0)] / (x1 x0)}
Repeat the process. Use x1 and x2 to produce another secant
line, and then uses its root to approximate . This yields the
general iteration formula
xn+1 = xn f (xn) [f (xn) f (xn1)] / (xn xn1), n= 1, 2, 3...
This is called the secant method for solving f (x) = 0.
The secant method requires more iterates than the Newton
method. But note that the secant method does not require a
knowledge of f( x), whereas Newtons method requires both f
(x) and f (x).
Note also that the secant method can be considered an
approximation of the Newton method.
By using the approximation

xn+1 = xn [f (xn)/f(xn)], f(xn) f (xn) f (xn1) / xn xn1


The secant method requires 1 function evaluation per iteration,
following the initial step. For this reason, the secant method is
often faster in time, even though more iterates are needed
with it than with Newtons method to attain a similar accuracy.

EXAMPLE: Solve the equation


f (x) x6 x 1 = 0
The quantity xn xn1 is used as an estimate of xn1. The
iterate x8 equals rounded to nine significant digits. The initial
iterates do not converge rapidly. But as the iterates become
closer to , the speed of convergence increases.
ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES
Advantages:

1. It converges at faster than a linear rate, so that it is more rapidly


convergent than the bisection method..

2. It does not require use of the derivative of the function, something


that is not available in a number of applications.

3. It requires only one function evaluation per iteration, as compared


with Newtons method which requires two.

Disadvantages:

1. It may not converge.

2. There is no guaranteed error bound for the computed iterates.

3. It is likely to have difficulty if f () = 0. This means the x-axis is


tangent to the graph of y = f (x) at x = .

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