How to Get Rid of Arctan

Trigonometric expressions can be nasty. So it's too bad they spring up over and over in the solutions to problems that have nothing to do with geometry. The inverse tangent, or arctan, is a good example. The arctan shows up in all sorts of problems dealing with population, mechanical stress, rocket propulsion --- the arctan seems to be everywhere. However, a series expansion for the arctangent that was discovered a few hundred years ago can come in handy today.

Instructions

    • 1
      The derivative of the arctangent is a nice, clean algebraic expression, so take advantage of that when you can.

      Replace all expressions containing the derivative of the arctangent. If the arctan appears as a derivative, as in d/dx(arctan(ax)), you can easily substitute, because the derivative of the arctan is 1/(1 + x^2).

    • 2

      Replace the arctan by its infinite series expansion, discovered by James Gregory in the 17th century.

      arctan (x) = x - x^3/3 + x^5/5 - x^7/7 + x^9/9 -....

    • 3

      Determine the required accuracy of the problem, and cut off the infinite series at the point where that accuracy is exceeded. That is, continue to add terms to the series until a term is smaller than your desired accuracy. For example, if 1 percent accuracy is acceptable for a problem in which x = .74, you would keep adding terms to the expansion until a term is smaller than 1 percent of 0.74. The fifth term, x^9/9 equals .00739. Dividing that by .74 results in an answer smaller than .001. Each additional term will be smaller and you can ignore them and reach the desired accuracy of 1 percent.

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