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Substitution (algebra)
In algebra, the operation of substitution can be applied in various contexts involving formal objects containing symbols (often called variables or indeterminates); the operation consists of systematically replacing occurrences of some symbol by a given value. Substitution is a basic operation of computer algebra. It is generally called "subs" or "subst" in computer algebra systems. A common case of substitution involves polynomials, where substitution of a numerical value for the indeterminate of a (univariate) polynomial amounts to evaluating the polynomial at that value. Indeed, this operation occurs so frequently that the notation for polynomials is often adapted to it; instead of designating a polynomial by a name like ''P'', as one would do for other mathematical objects, one could define :P(X)=X^5-3X^2+5X-17 so that substitution for ''X'' can be designated by replacement inside "''P''(''X'')", say :P(2) = 13 or :P(X+1) = X^5 + 5X^4 + 10X^3 + 7X^2 + 4X - 14. Substitution c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Algebra
Algebra () is one of the broad areas of mathematics. Roughly speaking, algebra is the study of mathematical symbols and the rules for manipulating these symbols in formulas; it is a unifying thread of almost all of mathematics. Elementary algebra deals with the manipulation of variables (commonly represented by Roman letters) as if they were numbers and is therefore essential in all applications of mathematics. Abstract algebra is the name given, mostly in education, to the study of algebraic structures such as groups, rings, and fields (the term is no more in common use outside educational context). Linear algebra, which deals with linear equations and linear mappings, is used for modern presentations of geometry, and has many practical applications (in weather forecasting, for example). There are many areas of mathematics that belong to algebra, some having "algebra" in their name, such as commutative algebra, and some not, such as Galois theory. The word ''algebra'' is ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Variable (mathematics)
In mathematics, a variable (from Latin '' variabilis'', "changeable") is a symbol that represents a mathematical object. A variable may represent a number, a vector, a matrix, a function, the argument of a function, a set, or an element of a set. Algebraic computations with variables as if they were explicit numbers solve a range of problems in a single computation. For example, the quadratic formula solves any quadratic equation by substituting the numeric values of the coefficients of that equation for the variables that represent them in the quadratic formula. In mathematical logic, a ''variable'' is either a symbol representing an unspecified term of the theory (a meta-variable), or a basic object of the theory that is manipulated without referring to its possible intuitive interpretation. History In ancient works such as Euclid's ''Elements'', single letters refer to geometric points and shapes. In the 7th century, Brahmagupta used different colours to represent the u ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Indeterminate (variable)
In mathematics, particularly in formal algebra, an indeterminate is a symbol that is treated as a variable, but does not stand for anything else except itself. It may be used as a placeholder in objects such as polynomials and formal power series. In particular: * It does not designate a constant or a parameter of the problem. * It is not an unknown that could be solved for. * It is not a variable designating a function argument, or a variable being summed or integrated over. * It is not any type of bound variable. * It is just a symbol used in an entirely formal way. When used as placeholders, a common operation is to substitute mathematical expressions (of an appropriate type) for the indeterminates. By a common abuse of language, mathematical texts may not clearly distinguish indeterminates from ordinary variables. Polynomials A polynomial in an indeterminate X is an expression of the form a_0 + a_1X + a_2X^2 + \ldots + a_nX^n, where the ''a_i'' are called the coeffici ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Computer Algebra
In mathematics and computer science, computer algebra, also called symbolic computation or algebraic computation, is a scientific area that refers to the study and development of algorithms and software for manipulating mathematical expressions and other mathematical objects. Although computer algebra could be considered a subfield of scientific computing, they are generally considered as distinct fields because scientific computing is usually based on numerical computation with approximate floating point numbers, while symbolic computation emphasizes ''exact'' computation with expressions containing variables that have no given value and are manipulated as symbols. Software applications that perform symbolic calculations are called ''computer algebra systems'', with the term ''system'' alluding to the complexity of the main applications that include, at least, a method to represent mathematical data in a computer, a user programming language (usually different from the languag ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Computer Algebra System
A computer algebra system (CAS) or symbolic algebra system (SAS) is any mathematical software with the ability to manipulate mathematical expressions in a way similar to the traditional manual computations of mathematicians and scientists. The development of the computer algebra systems in the second half of the 20th century is part of the discipline of "computer algebra" or "symbolic computation", which has spurred work in algorithms over mathematical objects such as polynomials. Computer algebra systems may be divided into two classes: specialized and general-purpose. The specialized ones are devoted to a specific part of mathematics, such as number theory, group theory, or teaching of elementary mathematics. General-purpose computer algebra systems aim to be useful to a user working in any scientific field that requires manipulation of mathematical expressions. To be useful, a general-purpose computer algebra system must include various features such as: *a user interface allo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Polynomial
In mathematics, a polynomial is an expression consisting of indeterminates (also called variables) and coefficients, that involves only the operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and positive-integer powers of variables. An example of a polynomial of a single indeterminate is . An example with three indeterminates is . Polynomials appear in many areas of mathematics and science. For example, they are used to form polynomial equations, which encode a wide range of problems, from elementary word problems to complicated scientific problems; they are used to define polynomial functions, which appear in settings ranging from basic chemistry and physics to economics and social science; they are used in calculus and numerical analysis to approximate other functions. In advanced mathematics, polynomials are used to construct polynomial rings and algebraic varieties, which are central concepts in algebra and algebraic geometry. Etymology The word ''polynomial'' join ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Free Group
In mathematics, the free group ''F''''S'' over a given set ''S'' consists of all words that can be built from members of ''S'', considering two words to be different unless their equality follows from the group axioms (e.g. ''st'' = ''suu''−1''t'', but ''s'' ≠ ''t''−1 for ''s'',''t'',''u'' ∈ ''S''). The members of ''S'' are called generators of ''F''''S'', and the number of generators is the rank of the free group. An arbitrary group ''G'' is called free if it is isomorphic to ''F''''S'' for some subset ''S'' of ''G'', that is, if there is a subset ''S'' of ''G'' such that every element of ''G'' can be written in exactly one way as a product of finitely many elements of ''S'' and their inverses (disregarding trivial variations such as ''st'' = ''suu''−1''t''). A related but different notion is a free abelian group; both notions are particular instances of a free object from universal algebra. As such, free groups are defined by their universal property. History Free ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Universal Property
In mathematics, more specifically in category theory, a universal property is a property that characterizes up to an isomorphism the result of some constructions. Thus, universal properties can be used for defining some objects independently from the method chosen for constructing them. For example, the definitions of the integers from the natural numbers, of the rational numbers from the integers, of the real numbers from the rational numbers, and of polynomial rings from the field of their coefficients can all be done in terms of universal properties. In particular, the concept of universal property allows a simple proof that all constructions of real numbers are equivalent: it suffices to prove that they satisfy the same universal property. Technically, a universal property is defined in terms of categories and functors by mean of a universal morphism (see , below). Universal morphisms can also be thought more abstractly as initial or terminal objects of a comma category ( ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Function Composition
In mathematics, function composition is an operation that takes two functions and , and produces a function such that . In this operation, the function is applied to the result of applying the function to . That is, the functions and are composed to yield a function that maps in domain to in codomain . Intuitively, if is a function of , and is a function of , then is a function of . The resulting ''composite'' function is denoted , defined by for all in . The notation is read as " of ", " after ", " circle ", " round ", " about ", " composed with ", " following ", " then ", or " on ", or "the composition of and ". Intuitively, composing functions is a chaining process in which the output of function feeds the input of function . The composition of functions is a special case of the composition of relations, sometimes also denoted by \circ. As a result, all properties of composition of relations are true of composition of functions, such as the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lambda Calculus
Lambda calculus (also written as ''λ''-calculus) is a formal system in mathematical logic for expressing computation based on function abstraction and application using variable binding and substitution. It is a universal model of computation that can be used to simulate any Turing machine. It was introduced by the mathematician Alonzo Church in the 1930s as part of his research into the foundations of mathematics. Lambda calculus consists of constructing § lambda terms and performing § reduction operations on them. In the simplest form of lambda calculus, terms are built using only the following rules: * x – variable, a character or string representing a parameter or mathematical/logical value. * (\lambda x.M) – abstraction, function definition (M is a lambda term). The variable x becomes bound in the expression. * (M\ N) – application, applying a function M to an argument N. M and N are lambda terms. The reduction operations include: * (\lambda x.M \rightarrow(\l ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Homomorphism
In algebra, a homomorphism is a structure-preserving map between two algebraic structures of the same type (such as two groups, two rings, or two vector spaces). The word ''homomorphism'' comes from the Ancient Greek language: () meaning "same" and () meaning "form" or "shape". However, the word was apparently introduced to mathematics due to a (mis)translation of German meaning "similar" to meaning "same". The term "homomorphism" appeared as early as 1892, when it was attributed to the German mathematician Felix Klein (1849–1925). Homomorphisms of vector spaces are also called linear maps, and their study is the subject of linear algebra. The concept of homomorphism has been generalized, under the name of morphism, to many other structures that either do not have an underlying set, or are not algebraic. This generalization is the starting point of category theory. A homomorphism may also be an isomorphism, an endomorphism, an automorphism, etc. (see below). Each of th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ring (mathematics)
In mathematics, rings are algebraic structures that generalize fields: multiplication need not be commutative and multiplicative inverses need not exist. In other words, a ''ring'' is a set equipped with two binary operations satisfying properties analogous to those of addition and multiplication of integers. Ring elements may be numbers such as integers or complex numbers, but they may also be non-numerical objects such as polynomials, square matrices, functions, and power series. Formally, a ''ring'' is an abelian group whose operation is called ''addition'', with a second binary operation called ''multiplication'' that is associative, is distributive over the addition operation, and has a multiplicative identity element. (Some authors use the term " " with a missing i to refer to the more general structure that omits this last requirement; see .) Whether a ring is commutative (that is, whether the order in which two elements are multiplied might change the result) has ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
