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The Limit Comparison Test

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Jeova Nissi Margate
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19 views

The Limit Comparison Test

Uploaded by

Jeova Nissi Margate
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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The Limit Comparison Tests

In the comparison tests the idea is to compare a given series with a


series that is known to be convergent or divergent. For instance, the
series

reminds us of the series which is a geometric series with


and and is therefore convergent. Because the series is so
similar to a convergent series, we have the feeling that it too must be
convergent. Indeed, it is.
The inequality

shows that our given series has smaller terms than those of the
geometric series and therefore all its partial sums are also smaller
than 1 (the sum of the geometric series).

This means that its partial sums form a bounded increasing sequence,
which is convergent. It also follows that the sum of the series is less
than the sum of the geometric series:
Similar reasoning can be used to prove the following test, which
applies only to series whose terms are positive. The first part says that
if we have a series whose terms are smaller than those of a known
convergent series, then our series is also convergent.

The second part says that if we start with a series whose terms are
larger than those of a known divergent series, then it too is divergent.
In using the Comparison Test we must, of course, have some known
series for the purpose of comparison. Most of the time we use
one of these series:

• A p-series [ ∑ 1/np converges if p > 1 and diverges if p ≤ 1]

• A geometric series [∑ ar n –1 converges if |r| < 1 and diverges if |r|


≥ 1]
Example 1
Determine whether the series converges or diverges.

Solution:
For large n the dominant term in the denominator is 2n2, so we
compare the given series with the series ∑ 5/(2n2). Observe that

because the left side has a bigger denominator. (In the notation of
the Comparison Test, an is the left side and bn is the right side.)
We know that

is convergent because it’s a constant times a p-series with p = 2 > 1.


Therefore
is convergent by part (i) of the Comparison Test .
Note 1:
Although the condition an ≤ bn or an ≥ bn in the Comparison
Test is given for all n, we need verify only that it holds for n ≥ N,
where N is some fixed integer, because the convergence of a
series is not affected by a finite number of terms.
Note 2:
The terms of the series being tested must be smaller than
those of a convergent series or larger than those of a
divergent series.

If the terms are larger than the terms of a convergent series


or smaller than those of a divergent series, then the
Comparison Test doesn’t apply.
Consider, for instance, the series

The inequality

is useless as far as the Comparison Test is concerned


because is convergent and an > bn.
Nonetheless, we have the feeling that ∑ 1/(2n – 1) ought to be
convergent because it is very similar to the convergent geometric
series .

In such cases the following test can be used.


Example 3
Test the series for convergence or divergence.
Solution:
We use the Limit Comparison Test with

and obtain

Since this limit exists and ∑ 1/2n is a convergent geometric


series, the given series converges by the Limit Comparison
Test.
Estimating Sums
If we have used the Comparison Test to show that a series ∑ an
converges by comparison with a series ∑ bn, then we may be able
to estimate the sum ∑ an by comparing remainders.
We consider the remainder
Rn = s – sn = an + 1 + an + 2 + . . .
For the comparison series ∑ bn we consider the corresponding remainder
Tn = t – tn = bn + 1 + bn + 2 + . . .
Since an ≤ bn for all n, we have Rn ≤ Tn. If ∑ bn is a p-series, we can estimate
its remainder Tn.
If ∑ bn is a geometric series, then Tn is the sum of a geometric series and we
can sum it exactly.
In either case we know that Rn is smaller than Tn.
Example 5
Use the sum of the first 100 terms to approximate the sum of the
series ∑ 1/(n3 + 1). Estimate the error involved in this
approximation.
Solution: Since the given series is convergent by the
Comparison Test.

The remainder Tn for the comparison series ∑ 1/n3 was estimated


earlier using the Remainder Estimate for the Integral Test.
There we found that
Therefore the remainder Rn for the given series satisfies
With n = 100 we have

Using a programmable calculator or a


computer, we find that

with error less than 0.00005.

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