How would you find the domain of each: y=(3x+2)/(4x+1)? y=(x^2-4)/(2x+4)? y=(x^2-5x-6)/(x^2+3x+18)? y=(2^(2-x))/(x)? y=sqrt(x-3)-sqrt(x+3)? y=sqrt(2x-9)/(2x+9)?

2 Answers
Nov 22, 2017

The domain would be all real numbers except for any value of x that makes the statement impossible.

Explanation:

For example, we can look at your first statement, (3x+2)/(4x+2).

Any value of x that makes the denominator equal to 0 cannot be in the domain because you can't divide by zero.
To find what that value is, you can set up an equation like this:
4x + 2 = 0

After solving this, you would get the answer of x = -1/2, which means that x cannot equal -1/2, or the denominator will equal 0. So the domain for this one would be written x: x in RR, x != -1/2

You would do the same for the other fraction problems. In the second problem, you would need to factor the denominator or use the quadratic formula to find the non-domain values.

For your square root problems, the domain would be any value of x except for the ones that make the expression inside the sqrt negative, since you can't take the square root of a negative number.

For example, let's look at y = sqrt(x - 3) - sqrt(x + 3)
We can set up our equations again:
x - 3 = 0
x + 3 = 0

The answers here would be x = 3 and x = -3.
This means that any value of x that is lower than 3 (this would include -3, so we don't need to make any special considerations) will leave you with a value less that 0. None of these values can be part of the domain.
x: x in RR, x >= 3

The last question is an amalgam of these two problem types: x can not equal anything that will make the denominator equal 0 or anything that will make the expression in the square root negative.

We can set up equations here again:
2x + 9 = 0 --> x = -9/2
2x - 9 = 0 --> x = 9/2

So anything less than 9/2 will make the square root negative, and -9/2 will make the denominator 0. Since -9/2 < 9/2, we don't need to add in an extra statement for it:
x: x in RR, x >= 9/2

I hope that makes sense and helps you solve the fraction problems that I did not address.

Nov 22, 2017

Please see below.

Explanation:

Domain in y=f(x) means thee values which x can take. For finding domain we normally start in a reverseway i.e. values which x cannot take.

For example if we have x-a in denominator, as we cannot have denominator as 0, we cannot have x=a. Similarly, if we have sqrt(x-a) as we cannot have square root og a negative number, we cannot have x-a<0 or x < a.

In case we have a quadratic polynomial such as ax^2+bx+c in denominator, we should either factorise it to a(x-alpha)(x-beta) or convert it to form a(x-h)^2+k, to check restrictions on the value of x.

Sometimes factors may cancel out, if they are common between numerator and denominator. In that case, we call it a hole, because though f(x) may be defined.

  1. In y=(3x+2)/(4x+1), domain isall x other than x=-1/4, as latter makes denominator 0.
  2. In y=(x^2-4)/(2x+4)=((x+2)(x-2))/(2(x+2))=(x-2)/2 and we cannot have x=+-2 and domain is values of x other than +-2 and at x=2, we have a hole.
  3. As y=(x^2-5x-6)/(x^2+3x+18)=((x-6)(x+1))/((x+3/2)^2+63/4). Note that least value of denominator is 63/4 and hence y=f(x) exists for all vales of x and hence domain is RR.
  4. In y=2^(2-x)/x, we have no restrictions on x as far as numerator is concerned, however, denominator restricts domain of x so that x!=0.
  5. In y=sqrt(x-3)-sqrt(x+3) , as we have sqrt(x-3) we cannot have x<3 and as we also have sqrt(x+3), other restriction is we cannot have x<-3. This means domain is x>=3.
  6. As y=sqrt(2x-9)/(2x+9), numerator places a restriction that x>=9/2 and denominator x!=-9/2. This can be combined and domain is x>=9/2.