Limit of Summation: Find Solution

  • Thread starter Thread starter Kurani
  • Start date Start date
  • Tags Tags
    Limit Summation
Kurani
Messages
6
Reaction score
0

Homework Statement



Find the limit n to Infinity of summation (i=1 to n) 1/n * ((i/n)^2)


The Attempt at a Solution



I thought it was zero at first because 1/n goes to zero but apparently that's not right. I also tried to convert to an integral and got integral of i^2/n^2 which equals i^3/3*n^2 but that's not right either.
 
Physics news on Phys.org
Kurani said:

Homework Statement



Find the limit n to Infinity of summation (i=1 to n) 1/n * ((i/n)^2)


The Attempt at a Solution



I thought it was zero at first because 1/n goes to zero but apparently that's not right. I also tried to convert to an integral and got integral of i^2/n^2 which equals i^3/3*n^2 but that's not right either.

Assuming you have typed what you meant to type, you can factor out the n's:

\sum_{i=1}^n \frac 1 n \frac {i^2}{n^2} = \frac 1 {n^3}\sum_{i=1}^n i^2

Do you know the formula for the sum of the first n squares? Put that in and see what happens as n → ∞.
 
Yeah, I realized I had to do that right after I posted, it comes out to 1/3. Thanks
 
There are two things I don't understand about this problem. First, when finding the nth root of a number, there should in theory be n solutions. However, the formula produces n+1 roots. Here is how. The first root is simply ##\left(r\right)^{\left(\frac{1}{n}\right)}##. Then you multiply this first root by n additional expressions given by the formula, as you go through k=0,1,...n-1. So you end up with n+1 roots, which cannot be correct. Let me illustrate what I mean. For this...
Back
Top