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Classroom Tips and

Techniques: A First Look at
Convolution
Robert J. Lopez
Emeritus Professor of Mathematics and Maple Fellow
Maplesoft
This document summarizes a presentation of the concept of convolution in the Laplace transform portion
of an introductory course in differential equations. The document mode in which this summary is
written hides most of the input devices used for creating the learning objects found here. The output can
be removed (Edit/Remove Output/From Worksheet) and restored calculation-by-calculation, but the
(math) cursor needs to be positioned by hand at the end of each input command.
Piecewise functions have been predefined, and graphs have been pre-computed in the auto-execute
region below. This device hides all the extraneous information not pertinent to the flow of the
presentation. Of course, all this information can be exposed by expanding the various document blocks
containing the hidden materials.
The conceptual content of the presentation centers on the definition of the convolution integral. An
animation is used to provide an intuitive understanding of what the convolution integral does, and two
computational devices are presented for evaluating the convolution.
For elementary functions such as and , the convolution integral is easily evaluated in Maple.
After all, it's just a definite integral. For piecewise-defined functions, the convolution integral contains
entangled conditional statements that easily become too complex for even Maple to unravel unaided. In
this case, we show how to interpret the integration process in the framework of integration.
Alternatively, we show that use of the convolution theorem for Laplace transforms leads to an
immediate evaluation of the convolution for functions amenable to Maple's laplace and invlaplace
commands.
Maple has been initialized
We begin by defining two piecewise functions and displaying their graphs.
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0 1 2 3
0
1
The following table contains a definition of the convolution integral, followed by graphical tools for
interpreting this definition.
The Convolution Integral

x
0 1 2
1
x
0 1 2 3 4 5
0
1
t = 0.
The figure on the left shows (in blue) the graph of , and (in red), the graph of , a reflection
across the -axis of the graph of . Thus, is a translation (to the right) of the graph of ,
and is its reflection across the -axis.
On the right is an animation. (Click on the figure to expose the animation tool-bar at the top of the
Maple window.) This animation shows (in red), for a progression of -values. The product of
with , itself shown in black, is given by the thick blue curve. This is the integrand of the
convolution integral. The area under this integrand, shaded in green, is the value of the convolution
integral for each fixed value of . This particular animation shows that the amount of green starts out as
zero, increases, then decreases back to zero. Consequently, this approach to the convolution integral
gives the intuitive result that the convolution of and will be a unimodal function with a single
maximum.
For more insight into this particular convolution, we need to determine the exact value of the
convolution integral. We begin with the direct approach shown below.
Evaluating the Convolution Integral

Maple is unable to evaluate the convolution integral because the implied inequalities defining the domain of integration are too complex. To untangle these
inequalities, we note that the integrand is nonzero exactly when the inequalities
are satisfied. In the -plane, a graphical representation of the feasible set is shaded in green in the following figure.
x
0 1 2 3 4 5
t
0
1
2
3
4
5
For fixed , the convolution integral defines the following piecewise function.

A graph of the convolution so computed is shown below.
t
0 1 2 3 4 5 6
0
Graph of the convolution
As we have just seen, it can be a tedious task to obtain a convolution by directly evaluating its defining
definite integral. Many convolutions met in the introductory differential equations courses can be
evaluated more easily via the following device.
The Convolution Theorem
The convolution theorem states that the Laplace transform of a convolution is the product of the transforms of the factors in the convolution product. Hence, if this
theorem is written as

we can obtain the convolution of and by inverting the product of the transforms of the factors and . Done below, this is the approach taken by the
author in his differential equations courses at the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. It always surprised him that his colleagues in the engineering departments
settled for the graphical approach captured in the animation given earlier.
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That the two calculations of the convolution are equivalent is established by the following calculation, which shows that the difference of the two simplifies to zero.
0 (4)
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