Computing the area of a region in the plane Instructions : There will be a question on the exam where you are

asked to compute the area of a region in the plane. The following 5 questions are similar to what you might see. Solutions are at the end. Problems 1. Find the area of the region in the plane bounded by the line y = x 1 and the parabola y = x2 4x + 3.

2. Find the area of the region in the plane bounded by the line parabolas y = x2 9 and y = x2 + 2x + 15.

3. Find the area of the region in the plane bounded by the parabola y = x2 + 2, the line y = x and the vertical lines x = 2 and x = 2.

4. Use integration to nd the area of the quadrilateral in the plane bounded by the lines x = 2, 1 y = 10 x, y = x 9, and y = 3x 14. 2

5. Find the area of the region bounded by the curve x = y 2 2y and the line x y 4 = 0.

Solutions 1. First we nd the points of intersection by setting the equations equal to each other. x 1 = x2 4x + 3 0 = x2 5x + 4 0 = (x 4)(x 1) So the curves intersect at the points (1, 0) and (4, 3). Since these are the only two points where the curves cross, one of the curves must be higher than the other curve on the interval (1, 4). If we pick a value like x = 2 in the interval, the y -value of the line is y = 2 1 = 1 while the y -value of the parabola is y = 4 8 + 3 = 1. So the line is above the parabola. The total area is found by integrating the distance between the curves from 1 to 4. That is, we integrate the bottom function subtracted from the top function.
4

Area =
1 4

top function bottom function dx (x 1) (x2 4x + 3) dx

1 4

= =
1

(x2 + 5x 4) dx
4 x3 5x2 + 4x 3 2 1 1 5 64 + 40 16 + 4 3 3 2

= = = 9 2

2. First we nd the points of intersection. x2 9 = x2 + 2x + 15 2x2 2x 24 = 0 2(x2 x 12) = 0 2(x 4)(x + 3) = 0 x = 3 and x = 4 Next we gure out which function is the above the other. The easiest is to plug in x = 0. The rst parabola given by y = x2 9 has y = 9 at x = 0 while the second parabola given by y = x2 + 2x + 15 has y = 15 and x = 0. So y = x2 + 2x + 15 is above y = x2 9 on the interval (3, 4). Therefore,
4

Area =
3 4

(x2 + 2x + 15) (x2 9) dx (2x2 + 2x + 24) dx

3 4 3

2x3 + x2 + 24x = 3 =

128 + 16 + 96 (18 + 9 72) 3 16 = 168 3

3. First we notice that the parabola and the line do not intersect in the interval (2, 2), by drawing the graph or thinking really hard about it. In fact, the graph of the parabola y = x2 + 2 is always above the line y = x. Therefore,
2

Area =
2 2

(x2 + 2) (x) dx (x2 x + 2) dx

2 x3

= = =

x2 + 2x 2

2 2

8 8 2+4 24 3 3 16 = +8 3 4. I dont have access to my program for drawing pictures, so I will try to describe the picture. However, it is very easy to graph these lines. Ill label the lines as follows: Line #1: Line #2: Line #3: Line #4: x = 2 y = 10 x y = 3x 14 1 y = x9 2

Line #1 and Line #2 intersect at the point (2, 12). Line #2 and Line #3 intersect when 10 x = 3x 14, that is, when x = 6,

so Line #2 and Line #3 intersect at the point (6, 4). Line #3 and Line #4 intersect when 1 x 9 = 3x 14, 2 that is, when x = 2,

so Line #3 and Line #4 intersect at the point (2, 8). Finally, Line #4 and Line #1 intersect at the point (2, 10). To nd the area of this region, we notice that Line #2 is above Line #4 on the interval [2, 2] and that Line #2 is above Line #3 on the interval [2, 6). Therefore, the area is the sum of two integrals
2 6

Area =
2 2

Line #2 Line #4 dx +
2

Line #2 Line #3 dx
6

=
2 2

(10 x) 3 x + 19 2
2

1 x9 2
6

dx +
2

(10 x) (3x 14) dx

=
2

dx +
2

(4x + 24) dx
6

3 x2 + 19x 4

+
2

2x2 + 24x
2

= (3 + 38) (3 38) + (72 + 144) (8 + 48) = 76 + 32 = 108

5. This one will be easier to do in terms of y . So we nd the points of intersection by setting x = y 2 2y equal to x = y + 4. y 2 2y = y + 4 y 2 3y 4 = 0 (y 4)(y + 1) = 0 y = 1 and y = 4 Since were going to integrate with respect to y , we need to know which function is larger in terms of y . On the graph this corresponds to the right-most curve. But we can do what we did before and plug in y = 0 into the two functions to see that the line is the right-most function.
4

Area =
1 4

(y + 4) (y 2 2y ) dy (y 2 + 3y + 4) dy
1 y3

= =

3y 2 + 4x 2

4 1

64 = + 24 + 16 3 3 65 = 44 2 3

1 3 + 4 3 2