All College Algebra Resources
Example Questions
Example Question #11 : Lines, Circles, And Piecewise Functions
What is the center and radius of a circle whose equation is given by:
Use completing the square to find the standard form of the equation for a circle:
subtract 6 from both sides:
Complete the square for the x and y parts of the equation:
Factor:
From the standard form of the equation of a circle we see that the center is at (3,1) and the radius is 2.
Example Question #101 : College Algebra
Find the x and y intercepts for
To find the x or y intercept in any equation we set y=0 or x=0 respectively.
for the x intercept:
The y intercept does not exist because to solve this equation for y requires complex roots (there will be a negative sign under the radical).
Example Question #102 : College Algebra
If (-1,-3) is a point on a circle with its center at (2,5), what is the radius of the circle?
None of these
Cannot be determined
We use the distance formula to determine the length of the radius:
Example Question #1 : Parabolas
Which of the following would give a graph of an upward facing parabola?
Which of the following would give a graph of an upward facing parabola?
Parabolas are created from polynomials where the highest exponent is 2.
To be an upward facing parabola, the squared term must be positive.
The only option that matches these criteria is:
Example Question #2 : Parabolas
Find the coordinates of the vertex of this quadratic equation:
This is not a parabola.
To find the vertex of this parabola use the following formula to find the x-coordinate of its vertex; find the y-coordinate by substituting the x-coordinate into the equation.
To find the y-coordinate, substitute -2 back into the quadratic equation:
The vertex is .
Example Question #3 : Parabolas
How many -intercepts does the graph of the function
have?
Two
Zero
One
Two
The graph of a quadratic function has an -intercept at any point at which , so, first, set the quadratic expression equal to 0:
The number of -intercepts of the graph is equal to the number of real zeroes of the above equation, which can be determined by evaluating the discriminant of the equation, . Set , and evaluate:
The discriminant is positive, so the equation has two solutions, both of which are real. Consequently, the graph of the function has two -intercepts
Example Question #2 : Parabolas
A baseball is thrown off the roof of a building 320 feet high at an initial upward speed of 80 feet per second; the height of the baseball relative to the ground is modeled by the function
How long does it take for the baseball to reach its highest point (nearest tenth of a second)?
The highest point of the ball is the vertex of the ball's parabolic path, so to find the number of seconds that is takes to reach this point, it is necessary to find the first coordinate of the vertex of the parabola of the graph of the function
The parabola of the graph of
has as its ordinate, or -coordinate,
,
so, setting ,
,
This is the time in seconds that it takes the ball to reach the highest point of its path.
Example Question #2 : Parabolas
Give the vertex of the parabola of the equation
The parabola of the equation has its vertex at a point with -coordinate ; set and in this formula to get
Substitute this for in the equation to obtain the corresponding -coordinate:
The vertex is at .
Example Question #2 : Parabolas
What is the multiplicity of the root of a quadratic equation with a discriminant equal to 0?
Quadratic equations whose discriminants are equal to zero have one repeated root (solution). Because this root appears twice in the quadratic equation, it has a multiplicity of 2. The number of times a factor appears in a polynomial, such as quadratic, is its multiplicity.
Example Question #3 : Parabolas
Define a function .
Which of the following is the -coordinate of the -intercept of its graph?
The -intercept of the graph of a function is the point at which it crosses the -axis; its -coordinate is 0, so its -coordinate is .
,
so, by setting ,
The -intercept is .