Scribd
Upload
48 views

Math 319/320 Homework 4 Solutions

This document contains solutions to 4 problems: 1) Classifying subsets of real numbers as open, closed, neither, or both. 2) Finding the interior, closure, boundary, and derived set for the sets in problem 1. 3) Giving examples of sets with specific properties related to closure, interior, and boundary. 4) Proving that neighborhoods of accumulation points contain infinitely many set points.

Uploaded by

Idnass Ssandi
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
48 views

Math 319/320 Homework 4 Solutions

This document contains solutions to 4 problems: 1) Classifying subsets of real numbers as open, closed, neither, or both. 2) Finding the interior, closure, boundary, and derived set for the sets in problem 1. 3) Giving examples of sets with specific properties related to closure, interior, and boundary. 4) Proving that neighborhoods of accumulation points contain infinitely many set points.

Uploaded by

Idnass Ssandi
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 2

Math 319/320 Homework 4 solutions

Problem 1. Classify the following subsets of R as open, closed, neither open nor
closed, or both open and closed:
(i) [1, 1] {2}
CLOSED, since [1, 1] is closed and {2} is closed, and the union of two closed sets
is closed.
(ii) {x R : sin x 0}
S
CLOSED. The complement of this set is nZ ((2n1), 2n). Since this complement
is a union of open intervals, it is open, so the set itself is closed.
S
1
1
(iii)
n=1 [ n+1 , n )
OPEN, since it is easy to verify that this union is just the open interval (0, 1).
(iv) {x (0, 1) : x is irrational}
NEITHER. This set is not open since for every irrational x (0, 1) and every neighborhood N (x, r), there are rational numbers in N (x, r). The set is not closed either,
since its closure is [0, 1], which is a larger set (recall that a set is closed iff it coincides
with its closure).
Problem 2. Find int(S), S 0 , cl(S) and bd(S) for each set S in problem 1.
(i) If S = [1, 1] {2}, then int(S) = (1, 1), S 0 = [1, 1], cl(S) = [1, 1] {2} and
bd(S) = {1, 1, 2}.
(ii) If S = {x R : sin x 0}, then
int(S) = {x R : sin x > 0} =

(2n, (2n + 1)),

nZ

S 0 = cl(S) = S and
bd(S) = {x R : sin x = 0} = {n : n Z}.
(iii) If S =
{0, 1}.

1
1
n=1 [ n+1 , n )

= (0, 1), then int(S) = S, S 0 = cl(S) = [0, 1] and bd(S) =

(iv) If S = (0, 1) r Q, then int(S) = , S 0 = cl(S) = bd(S) = [0, 1].

Problem 3. In each case, give an example of a non-empty set S R with the


corresponding property:
S = bd(S)
Any finite set S will do.
S 0 = bd(S)
Let S = [0, 1] Q. Then S 0 = bd(S) = [0, 1].
cl(S) = int(S)
Let S = R. Then cl(S) = int(S) = R.
Problem 4. Suppose S is a non-empty subset of R and x is an accumulation point
of S. Show that every neighborhood of x contains infinitely many points of S.
Assume by way of contradiction that some neighborhood N (x, r) of x contains only
finitely many points of S. Then the punctured neighborhood N (x, r) also contains
finitely many points of S. Let N (x, r)S = {p1 , p2 , . . . , pk }. Define = min{|xpj | :
j = 1, . . . , k} > 0. Then it is easy to check that N (x, ) S = . This contradicts x
being an accumulation point of S.
Bonus Problem. Does there exist a set S R, other than and R, such that
bd(S) = ?
The answer is NO. For any set S such that S 6= and S 6= R, we show that bd(S) 6= .
Choose some a S and some b R r S. Without losing generality, assume that
a < b (the case a > b is treated similarly). The set S [a, b] is non-empty (it contains
a) and bounded above (by b) so it has a least upper bound c = sup(S [a, b]). Note
that a c b. We claim that c bd(S).
Suppose there is a neighborhood N (c, r) which is contained in S. Then c + r b
since otherwise c b < c + r and we would have b S. It follows that c + 2r belongs
to S [a, b], which contradicts c = sup(S [a, b]).
Now suppose there is a neighborhood N (c, r) which is contained in R r S. Then
a c r since otherwise c r < a c and we would have a
/ S. It follows that
r
c 2 is an upper bound for S [a, b], which is a contradiction since c is the least
upper bound.
Summing up, we have shown that every neighborhood of c must intersect both S
and R r S. This implies c bd(S).

You might also like