z

100

An Introduction to
Partial Derivatives
10
10 y
x

Greg Kelly, Hanford High School, Richland, Washington

 When we have functions with
more than one variable, we
z
can find partial derivatives by
100 holding all the variables but
one constant.

f  x, y   100  x 2  y 2

df df
10  2 x  2 y
10 y dx dy
x
d2 f d2 f
 2 2
 2
dx 2 dy
df
Note:
dx
is also written as fx (eff sub ecks)

 df
would give you the slope of the
z dx tangent in the plane y=0 or in any
100 plane with constant y.

f  x, y   100  x 2  y 2

df df
10  2 x  2 y
10 y dx dy
x

In other words, how is changing one variable going to

change the value of the function?

Mixed variables are also possible:

f  x, y   x cos y  ye x f  x, y   x cos y  ye x
df df
 cos y  ye x   x sin y  e x
dx dy
d df d d df d
 cos y  ye x   x sin y  e x
dy dx dy dx dy dx

d2 f d2 f
  sin y  e x   sin y  e x
dy dx dx dy

f yx   sin y  e x f xy   sin y  e x
Both answers are the same!
