Directional Derivative of Lake Depth at Point (-1, 2) in Direction (4, 1)

RaulTheUCSCSlug
Gold Member
Messages
179
Reaction score
28
Having a melt down as I have done this problem twice now and my exam is tomorrow and I can't seem to figure it out anymore... ugh. 1. Homework Statement
The depth of a lake at the point on the surface with coordinates (x, y ) is given by D(x, y ) = 100−4x 2 −y 2 . a) If a boat at the point (−1, 2) is sailing in the direction 4~i +~j, is the water getting deeper or shallower ?

Homework Equations


I know that I need to use the gradient and I am going to need to have the direction scaled to a unit vector.

The Attempt at a Solution


So I took the gradient of D(x,y), plugged in (-1,2) then dotted it with the unit vector of (4,1) the answer is supposed to be 28/sqrt(17) and I can't seem to get that answer.
 
Physics news on Phys.org
never mind, I just kept doing the unit vector wrong. Simple arithmetic mistake.
 
Back
Top