-pari- said:
(d) y' = (3x - 5)^6 answer: [(3x - 5)^7]/21 + C
Just ask yourself, what differentiates to give (3x-5)^6? In general, what differentiates to give (ax+b)^c? (*)
Lets differentiate y = (ax+b)^c, see what we get and see if we can't fix it so we get what we want ...
1. y = (ax+b)^c, so chain rule (funtion inside a function rule). (#)
2. Let u = ax+b, then y = u^c.
3. Chain rule says dy/dx = dy/du * du/dx.
4. dy/du = cu^(c-1), du/dx = a.
5. dy/dx = a * cu^(c-1), but we know what u is (we invented it), so dy/dx = a * c(ax+b)^(c-1).
6. From (*) above, we wanted to get dy/dx = (ax+b)^c though, so what do we need to change in (#) to get that?
7. First thing we need is our power to be one more, so we get c as our final power, instead of c-1, so y = (ax+b)^(c+1) is a good start.
8. The stuff inside the brackets is all good, so lets leave it.
9. Now we have this extra a*c at the start, but keep in mind we just changed the c to c+1, so now we will get an a*(c+1) at the start of our derivative. How can we get rid of that? If we divide our y function by a*(c+1) we'll be good right? Because then at the end, we'll have (a*(c+1))/(a*(c+1)) which will just cancel away, so y = [ (ax+b)^(c+1) ] / (a*(c+1)) looks like the function we will need. We can add an arbitrary constant to this function too, since when we differentiate it will just differentiate away. You can check it just by differentiating y = [ (ax+b)^(c+1) ] / (a*(c+1)) + C and you should get y' = (ax+b)^c.
Now in your case, we have a = 3, b = -5, c = 6. Just plug em into that formula we just worked out, and you get:
[ (ax+b)^(c+1) ] / (a*(c+1)) + C
= [ (3x-5)^(6+1) ] / (3*(6+1)) + C
= [ (3x-5)^(7) ] / (21) + C
as required.