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Consortium for Mathematics and its Applications

Product ID: 99787
Supplementary Print
Undergraduate

Using Fractals to Motivate Linear Algebra (UMAP)

Author: Brian Habecker, Annalisa Crannell


We introduce a project that encourages the reader to "adopt" a fractal and then find out "everything" about it. We lead the reader through the concepts needed for the project: affine transformations, matrix notation and multiplication, determinants, eigenvalues and eigenvectors, and Hausdorff dimension. We refer the reader to relevant technology and software.

Table of Contents:

INTRODUCTION

WHAT IS A FRACTAL?

AFFINE TRANSFORMATIONS

UNDERSTANDING ITERATIONS VISUALLY

MATRIX AND VECTOR NOTATION

AREAS OF IMAGES OF THE ORIGINAL SQUARE

EIGENVALUES AND EIGENVECTORS

HAUSDORFF DIMENSION

SOFTWARE

SOLUTIONS TO THE EXERCISES

APPENDIX: FRACTALS FOR THE PROJECT ASSIGNMENT

REFERENCES

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

©2004 by COMAP, Inc.
UMAP Module
34 pages

Mathematics Topics:

Abstract & Linear Algebra

Application Areas:

Fractals, Dynamical Systems

Prerequisites:

multivalued functions; be able to perform function composition algebraically

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