ART OF NUMBERS

Binomial, Factorial
&
Pascal’s Triangle
 BINOMIAL THEOREM
 A binomial expression is a sum or difference
of two terms. For example,
 x + 1, 3x + 2y, a − b
 If we want to raise a binomial expression to a
power higher than 2, for example if we want
to find (x+1)7, it is very cumbersome to do this
by repeatedly multiplying x+1 by itself, 7
times.
 the binomial theorem (or binomial
expansion) describes the algebraic expansion
of integral powers of a binomial expression.
According to the theorem : For real numbers x and y,
any positive integer power of x + y can be expanded
into a sum of the form

Or,
Here, n is in { 1, 2, 3, …}

The binomial coefficients

The coefficients that appear in the binomial expansion
are called binomial coefficients, given by

Proof : (interested ?)
PROOF : Do yourself
EXAMPLES :
 GENERALIZATIONS
For any arbitrary real number r, one can define

(1)

Now, if x and y are real numbers with |x| > |y|, then,

For example,
(1 + x) for
r
= |x| < 1,r(r-1)
1 + rx + we have the expansions:
x2 + r(r-1)(r-2) x3 + …

2! 3!
FALLING FACTORIAL

 For any value of x in reals, and positive

integer n, we have
 (x)n

 And for n=0, we define its value as 1.

POWER SERIES
Power series in x about the point ξ

Let ξ ∈ R be a real number.

Let ⟨ak⟩ be a sequence in R.

The series:

ak (x−ξ)k

where x ∈ R is a variable, is called a power

series in x about the point ξ.
INTERVAL OF CONVERGENCE

 The interval of convergence of a power

series: ak (x − ξ)k

 is the interval of x-values that can be

plugged into the power series to give a
convergent series.

 The center of the interval of convergence is

always the anchor point of the power series,
ξ.
RADIUS OF CONVERGENCE (ROC)
 INTERVAL OF CONVERGENCE

If R is the radius of convergence, then

the interval of convergence I is given by
|x - ξ | < R
That is, I = { x ξ – R < x < ξ + R } = (ξ-R , ξ+R ).
Are the end-points in the Interval of Convergence?
The end-points (x = a − R and x = a + R) may or may not be part of
the interval of convergence.
To determine whether the end-points are in the interval of
convergence, you have to plug them into the power series (one at
a time) to get an infinite series.
Then use a convergence test to check whether the infinite series
converges. If the infinite series converges, then the particular
end-point is in the interval of convergence. Otherwise, it is not in
the interval of convergence.
 Theorem : Suppose a power series has radius
of convergence R. Then the function
  f : I → defined by

 is differentiable on I.
SKETCH OF THE PROOF

Need to show

 Let R be the roc of the power series on RHS :

 Using formula for R,

 Thus the interval of convergence of f(x) is |x| < 1,

 Thus for |x| < 1, power series f(x) is differentiable on interval of
convergence. This gives
 HISTORICAL NOTE:
 The General Binomial Theorem was first conceived
by Isaac Newton during the years 1665-1667.

 He announced the result formally, in letters to Henry

Oldenburg in the year 1676, but did not provide a proper
proof (at that time the need for the appropriate level of rigor
had not been recognised).

 Leonhard Paul Euler made an incomplete attempt in 1774,

but the full proof had to wait for Carl Friedrich Gauss to
provide it in 1812.

 This was, in fact, the first time anything about infinite

summations was proved adequately.
FACTORIALS
The factorial of a positive integer n, is
defined as,

The factorials of positive integers follow the

recurrence relation,

The factorials of negative integers cannot be

computed, since for n = 0, the recurrence
relation,

involves a division by zero.

 FACTORIAL CONTINUED -
 Euler in the year 1730 proved that the integral

 gives the factorial of x for all real non negative numbers.

 Euler’s factorial function, also known as the Pi function,
Π(x), follows the recurrence relation for all positive real
numbers.

 In particular, if x = 0, 1, 2, 3, … (non negative integer),

then
Π(x) = x!
 In 1768, Euler defined the Gamma function,
Γ(z), and extended the concept of factorials to
all real negative numbers, except zero and
except negative integers.

 The Gamma(Γ) function is an extension of the

Π function, with its argument shifted down by
1.

 Also known as the Euler’s integral of the

second kind, it is a convergent improper
integral defined as above.
 The Euler’s gamma function is related to the
Pi function as follows:


 The gamma function is also extended to all

complex numbers, with a real part >0, except
for at zero and negative integers.
 The curve for gamma function is
 The birth of the real factorial function 
(1729 - 1826)
• The interest of Christian Goldbach in the problem of
interpolating the natural factorial n! to real
(positive) values was a driving force which gave
birth to the gamma function. 

• The first known representation of an interpolating

function of the factorial was given by Daniel
Bernoulli, not Leonhard Euler.

• The first definition of Euler (1729) bears the name

of Gauss, obviously erroneously.

• The definition of Daniel Bernoulli converges faster to

the limit than that of Euler.

http://www.luschny.de/math/factorial/history.html
 GENERALIZATION OF BINOMIAL THM

If x and y are real numbers with |x| > |y|, and r is

any arbitrary real number, one can define

(1)

Then, one has for |x| > |y|

 BINOMIAL EXPANSIONS USING
PASCAL’S TRIANGLE
 Consider the following expanded powers of
(a + b)n, where n is a whole number. Look for
patterns.
 REMARKS :
 Each expansion is a polynomial. There are some patterns to
be noted.

 In the expansion, there is one more term than the power of the
exponent. So, there are n+1 terms in the expansion of (a + b) n.

 In each term, the sum of the exponents is n, the power to

which the binomial is raised.

 The exponents of a start with n and decrease to 0. The last

term has no factor of a. The first term has no factor of b, so
powers of b start with 0 and increase to n.

 The coefficients start at 1 and increase through certain values

about "half"-way and then decrease through these same values
back to 1.
 PASCAL’S TRIANGLE

 Writing the binomial coefficients in a

triangular array, we get the Pascal’s triangle.
 It is named after French mathematician
Blaise Pascal. However, the set of numbers
that form Pascal's triangle were known before
Pascal.
 The rows are enumerated starting with row
n=0.
 Entries in each row are numbered from left
beginning with k=0.
SIMPLE WAY TO CONSTRUCT
PASCAL TRIANGLE

1
1 1
1 2 1
1 3 3 1
1 4 6 4 1
1 5 10 10 5 1
 Let’s try to find an expansion for (a + b)6 by adding
another row to the above shown Pascal’s Triangle

Thus the expansion for (a + b)6 is :

(a+b)6 = 1a6 + 6a5b+ 15a4b2 + 20a3b3 + 15a2b4 + 6ab5 + 1b6

For any binomial a + b and any natural number n,

(a + b)n = c0anb0 + c1an-1b1 + c2an-2b2 + .... + cn-1a1bn-1 + cna0bn

where the numbers c0, c1, c2,...., cn-1, cn are from the n-th row of
the Pascal’s triangle.
 PROPERTIES
 The diagonals going along the left and right
edges contain only 1's.
1
1 1
1 2 1
1 3 3 1
1 4 6 4 1
1 5 10 10 5 1
 PROPERTIES
 The diagonals next to the edge diagonals
contain the natural numbers in order.
1
1 1
1 2 1
1 3 3 1
1 4 6 4 1
1 5 10 10 5 1
FIGURATE NUMBER
 A figurate number, also known as a figural
number, is a number that can be represented
by a regular geometrical arrangement of
equally spaced points.
 If the arrangement forms a regular polygon,
the number is called a polygonal number.
 For example, we have triangular, square,
pentagonal, hexagonal numbers, etc. 
 Figurate numbers also comprise other shapes
such as centered polygons, L-shapes, three-
dimensional solids (tetrahedron), etc.
 For instance,
a triangle created with three points along a
given side results in a total of six
points.  Adding one more point to each side of
the triangle results in a total of ten
points.  Therefore, we can find the triangular
sequence of numbers as 1, 3, 6, 10, 15, 21....  

No of
1 3 6 10 15
points:
TRIANGULAR NUMBERS
The triangular number is a figurate number that
can be represented in the form of a triangular grid
of points where the first row contains a single
element and each subsequent row contains one
more element than the previous one.
  The polygonal numbers illustrated above
are called triangular, square, pentagonal,
and hexagonal numbers, respectively.

Pentagonal
figurate numbers

Hexagonal Numbers
A THREE-DIMENSIONAL FIGURATE
NUMBER : TETRAHEDRON
TETRAHEDRON NUMBERS
Note that each layer in the tetrahedron is actually part of
the Triangular Number Sequence (1, 3, 6, …)
Diagonals :

• The first diagonal is just "1"s.

• The next diagonal has the counting

numbers  (1,2,3, etc).

• The third diagonal has

the triangular numbers.

• The fourth diagonal, not

highlighted, has the tetrahedron
numbers.
 PROPERTIES
 Sum of the rows gives powers of 2.

SUM
1 1
1 1 2
1 2 1 4
1 3 3 1 8
1 4 6 4 1 16
1 5 10 10 5 1 32
 PROPERTIES
 Fibonacci sequence in Pascal’s Triangle.

SUM
1 1
1 1 1
1 2 1 2
1 3 3 1 3
1 4 6 4 1 5
1 5 10 10 5 1 8

Try this: make a pattern by going up and then

along; then add up the values
 PROPERTIES
 If you color the Odd and Even numbers, you
end up with a pattern the same as
the Sierpinski Triangle.
1
1 1
1 2 1
1 3 3 1
1 4 6 4 1
1 5 10 10 5 1
 SIERPINSKI TRIANGLE
 Start with an equilateral triangle.
 The Sierpinski triangle may be
constructed by repeated removal of
triangular subsets in the following
fashion:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Sierpinski_triangle_evolution.svg
FRACTAL
 PROPERTIES
Exponents of 11

Look carefully at each row of the triangle.

Putting together all the digits in the nth row gives you the nth power of 11.

• the first line (row=0) is just a "1“ : 110 = 1

• the second line is "1" and "1“ : 111 = 11

• the third line is "1", "2", "1“ : 112 = 121

 PROPERTIES
Symmetry
Do you see any symmetry in the triangle ?
The triangle is symmetrical about the vertical
line through its center.

The numbers on the left side have identical matching

numbers on the right side, like a mirror image.
 Using Pascal’s triangle
Heads and Tails
Let us see how many ways heads and tails
can combine when a coin is tossed n times.
For example, if you toss a coin three times, there is
• only one combination that will give you three
heads (HHH),
• three that will give two heads and one tail (HHT,
HTH, THH), and
• three that give one head and two tails (HTT, THT,
TTH) and
• one for no head and all Tails (TTT).
This is the pattern "1,3,3,1" in Pascal's Triangle.
Tosses Possible results Pascal’s Triangle

1 H 1,1
T
HH
2 HT, TH 1,2,1
TT
HHH
3 HHT, HTH, THH 1,3,3,1
HTT, THT,TTH
TTT
HHHH
HHHT,HHTH,HTHH,THHH
HHTT, HTHT, HTTH,THTH,
4 THHT, TTHH 1,4,6,4,1
HTTT, THTT,TTHT,TTTH
TTTT
Example: What is the probability of
getting exactly two heads with 4
coin tosses?

Solution : There are 1+4+6+4+1 = 16

(or 24=16) possible results, and 6 of
them give exactly two heads. So the
probability is 6/16, or 37.5%
Example 2: You have 16 pool balls. How
many different ways could you choose
just 3 of them (ignoring the order that
you select them)?

Solution : 3 balls to be chosen from 16

 Go to the start of row 16 (the top row is 0)
Then along 3 places (the first place is 0)
The value there is our answer, 560.
 Activity
Consider a set X of three elements, for example,
X= {apple, banana, cherry}

Consider all its subsets:

(Note: did you see a pattern in the numbers there?)

 Sets with four elements
Let now X = {apple, banana, cherry, strawberry}

(Note: if you did this right, there will be a pattern to the

numbers.)
 Sets with five elements
And now X = {apple, banana, cherry, strawberry, date}

Was there a pattern to the numbers?

Patterns :
Doubling
The first thing to notice is that the total number of subsets
doubles each time. So,

A set with n elements has 2n subsets

Another Pattern
Consider how many subsets of each size there were.

They are the numbers from Pascal’s Triangle!

The Mandelbrot Set fractal :

A fascinating aspect : If you zoom in, you'll see that this weird-looking
jagged edge is never smooth no matter what magnification you do. The
pattern of this big heart-shape repeats at random places forever, and
yet not in any particular predictable ordered fashion.
An animation Link on You tube :

https://youtu.be/G_GBwuYuOOs

In this animation, you can see the weird pattern for the
Mandelbrot Set at some level of magnification.
The Mandelbrot Set fractal :

• The Mandelbrot set is the set of values of c in the complex plane for
which the orbit of 0 under iteration of the quadratic map

remains bounded.

• That is, a complex number c is part of the Mandelbrot set if, when
starting with z0 = 0 and applying the iteration repeatedly, the
absolute value of zn remains bounded however large n gets. This can
also be represented as

• For example, letting c = 1 gives the sequence 0, 1, 2, 5, 26, ...,

which tends to infinity. As this sequence is unbounded, 1 is not an
element of the Mandelbrot set. On the other hand, c = −1 gives the
sequence 0, −1, 0, −1, 0, ..., which is bounded, and so −1 belongs to
the Mandelbrot set.
References for Fractals and/or Mandelbrot Set

There's no shortage of Mandelbrot set information out there

– a basic search for "Mandelbrot set“ turns up over 2,000
entries.
Some references for fractals
1) “Fractal Geometry of Nature” by Benoit Mandelbrot
himself.
2) Introduction to Fractals: The Geometry of Nature : http
://
www.safekid.org/images/emag/issue27/introduction-to
-fractals-the-geometry-of-nature.pdf
3) A page from wolfram :
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/MandelbrotSet.html
4) A few good resources can be obtained by searching for 
the Spanky fractal database, Peter Alfeld's Mandelbrot
page, and Eric Weisstein's 
Treasure Trove of Mathematics listing.