Practical Mathematics Using Matlab - Softcover

Backstrom, Gunnar

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0862383978 ISBN 13: 9780862383978

Publisher: Chartwell-Bratt, 1995

Synopsis

Mathematics for science and engineering undergraduates. Demonstrates basic numerical algorithms by comparison with analytic results. Explains applied mathematics in terms of elementary arithmetic. Teaches elementary programming by means of MATLAB. The MATLAB student editions are sufficient.

About this title

From the Back Cover

This volume is intended to be a guide for individual study or supervised courses in applied mathematics for scientists at undergraduate level. It may serve as an entry to college mathematics by introducing concepts in a striking manner or it may be used to illustrate the conventional, rather abstract, courses offered at universities.

This book is based on the student versions of MATLAB 5, which provide unique means for exploring algebra and calculus by a minimum of commands and syntactic rules.

In the first few chapters, MATLAB is used as an ordinary calculator. The concept of vectors is then introduced, and these serve as tools for drawing curves. The graphics is used in a direct way to find zeros, extreme points and limits, so that the relation to elementary arithmetic becomes obvious.

By very simple and concrete methods the reader is guided through algebra, calculus, probability theory and curve fitting, ordinary differential equations, and Fourier analysis. The student is supposed to type the short scripts employed, thus gradually becoming acquainted with basic programming.

Each group of subjects is completed by an introduction to the symbolic facilities of MATLAB. In this part of the software, the recipes of traditional mathematics are available, and analytic results may be obtained with little effort.

Synopsis

MATLAB originally arose from an endeavour to simplify matrix arithmetic. It requires neither types nor dimensions and saves much time in calculations where vectors and matrices play a dominant role. MATLAB is an extremely practical software package, allowing both exponentiation and complex numbers. In addition, it offers convenient graphical representation of data in the form of curves and surfaces, including default scaling of the co-ordinate axes. The idea behind this volume is to apply the main results of first-year university mathematics, starting with only a handful of MATLAB statements and gradually introducing more, as the need arises. Most of the applications are numeric and also illustrate elementary principles of programming. Students may work through the examples and the problems on a personal computer, either individually or in groups under supervision. The software used is available for the IBM PC and compatibles, for the Macintosh and for various workstations. The author has also published the volume, "Fields of Physics by Finite Element Analysis".

Edition details

• Publisher: Chartwell-Bratt
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 0862383978
• ISBN 13: 9780862383978
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 173