Calculus Flashcards, test questions and answers
Discover flashcards, test exam answers, and assignments to help you learn more about Calculus and other subjects. Don’t miss the chance to use them for more effective college education. Use our database of questions and answers on Calculus and get quick solutions for your test.
What is Calculus?
Calculus is a branch of mathematics that deals with the study of change. It is used to analyze and solve problems in a variety of fields, including physics, engineering, economics, and medicine. Calculus can be divided into two main parts: differential calculus and integral calculus. Differential calculus focuses on how quickly something changes over time by finding derivatives. Integral calculus looks at the accumulation of a quantity over a period of time by finding integrals. Differential calculus forms the foundation for many other branches of mathematics such as linear algebra, vector analysis, complex analysis, series theory and topology. In particular it is necessary for understanding basic physics concepts such as acceleration or velocity and for solving problems in fields like engineering or economics where knowledge about rates or gradients are required. Differential equations are used to describe natural phenomena such as planetary motion or chemical reactions that involve variables that change over time. Integral calculus is also used extensively in physics to calculate areas under curves (such as force vs displacement curves) which allows us to calculate work done by a force over a certain distance or find the average value of a function over an interval among other things. It can also be used in economics where it can be applied to consumer demand curves which show how much people are willing to pay at different price points or production cost curves which show how much it costs manufacturers to make products at different levels of output. The combination of both differential and integral calculus allows us to solve problems related to rates-of-change (derivatives) as well as areas-under-curves (integrals). This makes it an invaluable tool for many mathematical applications from predicting planetary motion through Newton’s Laws of Motion, describing natural phenomena like thermal expansion with thermodynamics equations all the way down to calculating optimal solutions for profit maximization in business models with economic optimization techniques.