Problem 1

Consider the polar equation:

() = sin(/2)
(a) Sketch the polar curve dened by the above equation (make sure to
draw all the curve!)
(b) Find all points of vertical or horizontal tangency;
(c) Find the point(s) of intersection of the curve with the vertical line
passing through the pole
(d) Find the tangent slope(s) at points found at the previous step
(e) Compute the length of the curve
Hint: you might nd the following identities of some use:
sin2 (/2) =

1 cos
2

cos2 (/2) =

1 + cos
2

Solution:
Observe that we need to take 0 4. The sketch looks like
0.8

0.6

0.4

0.2

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

0.2

0.4

0.6

0.8

0.8

0.6

0.4

0.2

Let us write the equation for the slope of the curve at angle :
d
=
d
=

d
sin + cos
d
=
d
cos sin
d
1
cos(/2) sin + sin(/2) cos
2
1
cos(/2) cos sin(/2) sin
2

Let us look for horizontal tangencies: we need to nd zeros of the numerator

cos(/2) sin + 2 sin(/2) cos = 0
Using the formula provided we have cos = 2 cos2 (/2) 1 and sin =
2 sin(/2) cos(/2). We gather
2 sin(/2) cos2 (/2) + 2 sin(/2)(2 cos2 (/2) 1) = 0.
we can factor 2 sin(/2), which gives us the solutions = 0 and = 2
(which give = 0: both correspond to the pole); the other solutions are
3 cos2 (/2) = 1
1
cos(/2) =
3
which correspond to the other four solutions.
Now let us nd vertical tangencies; we need to nd zeros of the equation
cos(/2) cos sin(/2) sin = 0
Using the previous formulas we have:
cos(/2)(2 cos2 (/2) 1) 4 sin2 (/2) cos(/2) = 0
We can now factor cos(/2), which gives /2 = /2 and /2 = 3/2,
that is = , 3 (for which = 1). Then we obtain the equation:
2 cos2 (/2) 1 4 sin2 (/2) = 0
6 cos2 (/2) = 5
which gives
cos(/2) =

5
6

which corresponds to the other four solutions.

In order to nd points of intersection with the indicatedline we need
to take = /2, 3/2, 5/2, 7/2, (which give || = 1/ 2)and = 0
(that is, the pole). We already found that the pole is a point of horizontal
tangency. Plugging in the values of in the formula for the slope, we
obtain that the slope is 1/2

The length of the curve can be computed using the formula:

=
0

1
cos2 (/2) + sin2 (/2) =
4

4
1
= 1 + cos + 4(1 cos ) =
2 2 0
4
1
=
5 3 cos .
2 2 0