West Bengal WbchseTextbookSubjectiveImportance★★★★★est
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✓ Free question
Concept understanding — Quadratic Equations with Complex Roots
Every quadratic equation ax2+bx+c=0 (with a=0) has solutions given by the familiar formula x=2a−b±b2−4ac, and this formula continues to work even when the discriminant D=b2−4ac is negative or when the coefficients a,b,c are themselves complex — the Fundamental Theorem of Algebra guarantees that a degree-n polynomial equation always has exactly n roots in the complex numbers, so a quadratic is never left without a solution. When a,b,c are real and D<0, the square root D is rewritten as i∣D∣, and the two roots that come out are complex conjugates of each other — if p+iq is one root, p−iq is automatically the other. When the coefficients are themselves complex (or when the discriminant is a general complex number rather than a negative real one), finding D requires the square-root-of-a-complex-number technique (writing the square root as a+ib and solving two simultaneous equations), and the two roots need not be conjugates of each other. A related, very useful trick is evaluating a polynomial p(x) at a known complex root: if x=p+iq satisfies a quadratic x2+Bx+C=0 with real coefficients built from that root and its conjugate, then dividing the target polynomial by that quadratic reduces the whole evaluation to a short remainder calculation instead of repeatedly expanding high powers of a complex number.
D=b2−4ac<0; write D=i∣D∣.
✓Final answer
x=2−1+i3 or x=2−1−i3.
For x2+x+1=0: a=1,b=1,c=1, D=1−4=−3. D=−3=i3. x=2−1±i3.
✓Final answer
x=2−1+i3 or x=2−1−i3.
Compute D=b2−4ac; since D<0, write D=i∣D∣ and substitute into the quadratic formula.
Computing D=1−4=−3 incorrectly as −4 (forgetting to subtract from b2=1, not 0)
Leaving the answer as an unsimplified fraction without separating real and imaginary parts