Structural Operations on Rational Expressions
For ordinary polynomials,
Factor and
Expand give the most important forms. For rational expressions, there are many different forms that can be useful.
Different kinds of expansion for rational expressions.
Here is a rational expression.
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Expand expands the numerator of each term, and divides all the terms by the appropriate denominators.
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ExpandAll does all possible expansions in the numerator and denominator of each term.
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| ExpandAll[expr,patt], etc. | avoid expanding parts which contain no terms matching patt |
Controlling expansion.
This avoids expanding the term which does not contain
.
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| Together[expr] | combine all terms over a common denominator |
| Apart[expr] | write an expression as a sum of terms with simple denominators |
| Cancel[expr] | cancel common factors between numerators and denominators |
| Factor[expr] | perform a complete factoring |
Structural operations on rational expressions.
Here is a rational expression.
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Together puts all terms over a common denominator.
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You can use
Factor to factor the numerator and denominator of the resulting expression.
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Apart writes the expression as a sum of terms, with each term having as simple a denominator as possible.
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Cancel cancels any common factors between numerators and denominators.
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Factor first puts all terms over a common denominator, then factors the result.
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In mathematical terms,
Apart decomposes a rational expression into "partial fractions".
In expressions with several variables, you can use
Apart
to do partial fraction decompositions with respect to different variables.
Here is a rational expression in two variables.
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This gives the partial fraction decomposition with respect to
.
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Here is the partial fraction decomposition with respect to
.
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