Math 3100: Sequences and Series

Fall 2015, Dr. Klipper

Practice Problems for Final Exam

Starting on the next page, there are several problems that have a similar level of difficulty
as the test questions. (This is not a practice test, though.) You can use these as a guide to
see what you should review.
Notes:

You will have to repeat some definitions on this test. You need to know how things
are defined to use them appropriately in proofs! You will also have to produce some
simple examples / counterexamples with certain properties.

The final exam will be a little longer than two in-class tests. Id say its more like a
2.5-hour test, though you may certainly spend 3 hours on it. Expect somewhere from
12 to 14 questions.

The three units of class will probably not be equally covered! There is probably
more emphasis on the material of the first test, especially with the definition of
limit.
There will be several problems which require the limit definition, meaning that
limit laws are forbidden.
Expect two questions covering the material of Section 3.2.

You will have to reprove results from class or old homework on this test. Be
familiar with old assignments and tests!

Any topic that was off-limits from earlier tests is still off-limits. However, the following
extra topics will also be guaranteed to be skipped on the final:

Intermediate and Extreme Value Theorems

Least upper bounds and greatest lower bounds
Cauchy sequences

There will be an optional extra-credit question at the end.

1
Problem 1
Part (a): Give the definition of lim an = .
n
Part (b): State the Completeness Principle (i.e. the bounded monotone convergence theo-
rem).
Part (c): State the Weierstrass M-Test, including all its hypotheses.
Problem 2
For each part, briefly present an example. No proofs are required.
Part (a): A sequence which has three subsequences with three different limits
Part (b): A power series with radius of convergence 3
HINT: You only have to make a small change to the geometric series...
Part (c): A sequence of functions which converges to 1 pointwise but not uniformly on
(, )
Problem 3
Use the definition of limit to prove that limn (6n + 1)/(3n + 4) = 2.
Problem 4
The Lucas numbers are like the Fibonacci numbers but have different initial values:

L0 = 2, L1 = 1, and Ln = Ln1 + Ln2 for all n 2

Prove by strong induction that Ln 2n+1 for all n 0.

Problem 5
Prove that if limn g(n) = and if limn an = L, then limn ag(n) = L.
(This is basically the proof that all subsequences have the same limit as the whole se-
quence, or you can view it as a version of the composition limit law.)
Problem 6
Prove that if an is decreasing and lim(an ) = L exists, then L an for all n N.
HINT: Assume for contradiction that ak < L for some k N. (You had a similar problem
on your homework.)
Problem 7
Find the domain of convergence of the power series

X 5n(x 1)n
f (x) =
n=2
n3 + 1

Make sure to indicate whether the endpoints of the domain converge absolutely or condi-
tionally (if they converge).

2
Problem 8
Prove that
X n2 + x sin(nx)
n=1
n2
does not converge for any x [, ], but

X x sin(nx)
n=1
n2

converges uniformly on [, ].
Problem 9
In this problem, youll obtain a Divergence Test for uniform convergence!
P
Part (a): Prove that if an (x) converges uniformly on a set A, then an (x) converges to 0
uniformly on A.
HINT: This proof is almost exactly like the proof of the Divergence Test from class.
Part (b): Use this to prove why the power series for ex does not converge uniformly on
(, ) (although it is known to converge uniformly on bounded intervals like [a, b] or
[M, M ].)
Problem 10
sin(2x)
Find P6 for . Briefly explain any truncations you perform.
1 x4
Problem 11
Part (a): Use an appropriate Taylor approximation to prove that
Z 1/4 (1/4)2 15
cos( t) dt (1/4) = 0.2344
0 4 64

Part (b): Estimate the magnitude of the error you get in the approximation from part (a).
NOTE: There are a couple different values of n that could produce the approximation
above. Either of them would yield an acceptable answer for this problem. (Can you find
them both and determine which error bound is better?)
Extra-Credit Problem
P
Suppose that an converges.
P
Part (a): Give an example which shows that a2n might diverge.
HINT: Think of alternating series. P P P
Part (b): However, if an 0 for each n, prove that a2n converges and that a2n an .
HINT: You cant use the Comparison Test since you dont know whether a2n an . (In
fact, an might not be monotone!) Instead, consider partial sums of both series. You may
want to go back to your notes to remind yourself why nonnegative series were much easier
to test than series with mixed signs of terms.