What is the volume enclosed by the parabolic cylinder and two planes?

  • Thread starter Thread starter fishingspree2
  • Start date Start date
  • Tags Tags
    Surfaces Volume
fishingspree2
Messages
138
Reaction score
0

Homework Statement



Find the volume of the solid enclosed by the parabolic cylinder y=10 - a2x2 and the planes z=y and z=2-y, where a > 0 is a constant.

Homework Equations


I have graphed the 3 surfaces on Maple to visualize the solid enclosed by these surfaces but the problem is there is no closed solid. There is not one single closed solid formed so I really don't know which volume we are looking for. Computing the volume of an unclosed solid would give me an infinite volume, which I am sure is not what the question asks. Can someone please help me?

2rrnxxh.jpg

using a =2
 
Last edited:
Physics news on Phys.org
i think maybe you have graphed z=10 - a^2y^2, rather than y=10 - a^2x^2
 
then you will need to separate into 2 integrals, depending on which plane is the bound
 
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