Understanding Simple Poles and Residues in Function 1/(z^4 + 1)

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I have a function 1/(z^4 + 1)

I know the poles are pi/4, 3pi/4, 5pi/4, 7pi/4

It says they are simple poles, I thought I understood why, but now I am totally confused. How does my lecturer just know that they are simple?

A simple pole is a pole of order 1, but I thought this meant you look at the series and get the order from the highest indice of z on the denominator?

Help!

Cheers
 
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The numerator has simple zeroes, so the function is pof the form:

1/[(z-a)(z-b)(z-c)(z-d)]

where a, b, c, and d are different. If you expand this around, say, z = a, you can proceed as follows. You can write the function as:

1/(z-a) * 1/[(z-b)(z-c)(z-d)]

The factor 1/[(z-b)(z-c)(z-d)] is not singular at z = a, so it has a regular Taylor expansion. So, the Laurent expansion of the function around z = a is given by the Taylor expansion of that factor times 1/(z-a).
 
What is a simple zero?
 
philip041 said:
I have a function 1/(z^4 + 1)

I know the poles are pi/4, 3pi/4, 5pi/4, 7pi/4
Then you know wrong. The poles are [itex](\sqrt{2}/2)(1+ i)[/itex], [itex]-(\sqrt{2}/2)(1- i)[/itex], [itex](-\sqrt{2}/2)(1+ i)[/itex], and [itex](\sqrt{2}/2)(1- i)[/itex], which can be written [itex]e^{i\pi/4}[/itex], [itex]e^{3i\pi/4}[/itex], [itex]e^{5i\pi/4}[/itex], and [itex]e^{7i\pi/4}[/itex].

It says they are simple poles, I thought I understood why, but now I am totally confused. How does my lecturer just know that they are simple?

A simple pole is a pole of order 1, but I thought this meant you look at the series and get the order from the highest indice of z on the denominator?

Help!

Cheers
[tex]\frac{1}{z^4+ 1}= \frac{1}{z- (\sqrt{2}/2)(1+ i)}\frac{1}{z+ (\sqrt{2}/2)(1-i)}\frac{1}{z+(\sqrt{2}/2)(1+ i)}\frac{1}{z-(\sqrt{2}/2)(1-i)}[/tex]
Each of those numbers is a "simple pole" or "pole of order 1" because each has a power of 1 in the denominator.
 
Cheers, this helps!