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Alec Neeson
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Can someone explain the concept to me. Does it mean the the a's of n and b's of n are 90 degrees apart? I know the inner-product of the integral is 0 if the two are orthogonal.
Alec Neeson said:Can someone explain the concept to me. Does it mean the the a's of n and b's of n are 90 degrees apart? I know the inner-product of the integral is 0 if the two are orthogonal.
ElijahRockers said:If that's a little wordy for you, maybe I can dumb it down. Just keep in mind I am only now learning this stuff myself.
Remember how you used {i, j, k} to represent orthogonal unit vectors? It's the same idea with {cos(x), cos(2x), ... , cos(Nx)}.
The same way you could represent any 3D vector as xi + yj + zk, you can represent any function as a sum of sines and cosines of varying frequency.
cos(1x) is orthogonal to cos(.9999x) -> meaning the slightest variation in frequency will result in a pair of orthogonal functions...
I think.
LCKurtz said:No. That isn't true. Orthogonality depends very much on the particular frequencies and the interval of definition.
ElijahRockers said:We learned in class that {cos(x), cos(2x), ... , cos(Nx)} forms an orthogonal set... is this true?
Not to hijack the thread, but I'm trying to get some visual intuition on how orthogonality depends on the frequency.
A Fourier series is a mathematical concept that represents a periodic function as a sum of sinusoidal functions with different frequencies and amplitudes.
Orthogonality is significant in Fourier series because it allows for the decomposition of a function into its constituent sinusoidal components. This simplifies the analysis of complex periodic functions and makes it easier to understand their behavior.
The coefficients in a Fourier series can be determined using integration techniques, such as the Fourier series coefficients formula or the orthogonality property. These coefficients represent the amplitude and phase of each sinusoidal component in the series.
No, Fourier series can only be used for periodic functions. However, there are extensions of Fourier series, such as the Fourier transform, that can be used for non-periodic functions.
Fourier series have many practical applications, such as signal processing, image and sound compression, and solving differential equations. They are also commonly used in fields like engineering, physics, and mathematics for analyzing and understanding periodic phenomena.