Mathematics Department

Textbook Contents

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Separable Equations

Additional Examples

Solve the following initial value problem, $$\begin{align} \frac{dy}{dx} &= 2\cos(3x)(y^2 - 9y + 20)\\ y(\pi/12) &= 2 \end{align}$$This is a separable equation. First we find the general solution following the paradigm.

  1. Separate the variables $$ \frac{dy}{y^2 - 9y + 20} = 2\cos(3x) dx $$
  2. Integrate both sides $$ \log|y - 5| - \log|y - 4| = (2/3)\sin(3x) + C $$
  3. Solve for y (if possible)

    We simplify the expression to obtain the general solution $$ \frac{y - 5}{y - 4} = k \exp((2/3)\sin(3x)) $$

  4. Check for singular solutions

    We divided by $y^2 - 9y + 20$ which is 0 when $y = 5$ or $y = 4.$ We can check these are both solutions. Now $y = 5$ is already in the general solution (when the constant is 0), but $y = 4$ is a singular solution.

Now we plug in the initial values $x = \pi/12$ and $y = 2$ and solve for the arbitrary constant, which we compute to be $(3/2)\exp(-\sqrt{2}/3).$ So the solution to the initial value problem is $$\frac{y - 5}{y - 4} = (3/2)\exp((2/3)(\sin(3x) - \sqrt{2}/2)).$$

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