Suppose you wanted to know if Log@xDn was concave up for

some n.We know that it is concave down everywhere for n = 1, but hey;
maybe it is concave up for some n > 1. Hn = ã is probably a good guess.L

Then you might start by defining f Hx, nL = Log@xDn

In[11]:= f@x_, n_D := Log@xD ^ n

In[12]:= D@f@x, nD, xD

n Log@xD-1+n
Out[12]=
x

In[13]:= Factor@D@D@f@x, nD, xD, xDD

n H- 1 + n - Log@xDL Log@xD-2+n
Out[13]=
x2

In[14]:= Solve@% Š 0, xD

Out[14]= 99x ® ã-1+n ==

And you might take a couple of derivatives and set the second derivative equal
to zero and solve for x to determine what the points of inflection are.And so,
the only point ofinflectionarex = ãn-1 .We can also see that as x ® ¥,
f '' Hx, nL ® - ¥.So, for any n, fHx, nL is concave up onI0, ãn-1 M and concave
downon Iãn-1 , ¥M.So, even if the graph is concave up for a bit, it will always be
concave down as x ® ¥.
2 Log[x]^n.nb

In[15]:= PlotAf@x,2D,8x,0,14<,PlotRange®8-1,8<,
PlotStyle®Orange,PlotLabel®"y=Log@xD2 "E

y=Log@xD2
8

4
Out[15]=

2 4 6 8 10 12 14

you might notice that f H1, nL = 0 and f Hã, nL = n; this is illustrated with a few graphs below.
But why stop there ? In doing that analysis,
 Log[x]^n.nb 3

In[31]:= PlotA8f@x,0D,f@x,.5D,f@x,1D,f@x,2D,f@x,3D,f@x,4D,f@x,5D,f@x,100D<,8x,.5,E+.5<,
PlotStyle®8Red,Blue,Green,Orange,Black,Brown,Cyan,Purple<,PlotRange®8-.1,1.1<,
PlotLabel®"Log@xD in Blue, Log@xD100 in Purple"E

Log@xD in Blue, Log@xD100 in Purple

1.0

0.8

0.6
Out[31]=

0.4

0.2

1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0

And now, you might be curious as to the area between

Log@xD and each of those other graphs as n increases : for example,
what is the area between Log@xD and Log@xD2 on this interval ? To
evaluate the definate integral that will give us that area,

first we ' ll need to derive an expression for à Log@xDn â x.

4 Log[x]^n.nb

à Log@xD â x
n
In[32]:=

Out[32]= H-logHxLL-n logn HxL GHn + 1, -logHxLL

Well, that' s not very helpful. It is a further generalized version of

the expression I came up with, which works only for the integers; but to
see what we want to see, all we need is the integers. To do this inte-
gral, I began with an integration by parts.

Ù Log@xDn âx = xLog@xDn - Ù n Log@xDn-1 âx, where I used the substitution

n Log@xDn-1 âx
u = Log@xDn , âu = x
, âv = âx and v = x.
If we then use integration by parts again, we obtain
xLog@xDn - n Log@xDn-1 + Ù nHn - 1L Log@xDn-2 âx, and by now you can probably see
where this is heading. If we nest it into a summation,
then

Ù Log@xDn âx = x Únk=0
H-1Lk n! Log@xDn-k
Hn-kL!
, and we have the explicit value of the indef-
inite integral for any n > 0.

So, let us return to the problem at hand. We are trying to evaluate

Ù1 HLog@xD - Log@xDn L âx
ã

which we can now re-write as

A = Jã Ú1k=0 -ã Únk=0 N-JÚ1k=0 - Únk=0 N

H-1Lk Log@ãD1-k H-1Lk n! Log@ãDn-k H-1Lk Log@1D1-k H-1Lk n! Log@1Dn-k
H1-kL! Hn-kL! H1-kL! Hn-kL!

A = JãH1 - 1L - ã Únk=0 H-1Lk n!

Hn-kL!
N -H-1 - H-1Ln n!L

A = H-1Ln n! + 1 - ã Únk=0 H-1Lk n!

Hn-kL!

And we have an explicit function in terms of n for the area.

n H-1L^k n!
Hn-kL!
In[18]:= A@n_D:=-Eâ +H-1L^n n!+1
k=0
 Log[x]^n.nb 5

In[19]:= Table@N@A@xDD,8x,0,5,1<D

Out[19]= 8- 0.718282, 0., 0.281718, 0.436564, 0.535464, 0.6044<

As you might predict from the graphs given earlier,

Lim à Log@xDn â x = 0,
ã

n®¥ 1

which gives us the formula

H- 1Lk n !
H- 1Ln n ! + 1 - ã â = 1, since à Log@xD â x = 1.
n ã

Hn - kL !
Lim
n®¥ 1
k=0

This sequence converges relatively slowly though,

HA fact that would be interesting to prove, even though a simple method of

despite the fact that it is always increasing.

doing so isn ' t obvious to me.L Below is a graph of the sequence and a table of its values :

In[35]:= ListPlot@Table@8n,N@A@nDD<,8n,0,16<D,Joined®True,
PlotStyle®Orange,PlotRange®80,1<D
Table@8n,N@A@nDD<,8n,0,16<D
1.0

0.8

0.6

Out[35]=
0.4

0.2

0 5 10 15

880, - 0.718282<, 81, 0.<, 82, 0.281718<, 83, 0.436564<, 84, 0.535464<, 85, 0.6044<,
86, 0.655315<, 87, 0.69451<, 88, 0.725638<, 89, 0.750972<, 810, 0.771998<, 811, 0.789735<,
Out[36]=

812, 0.8049<, 813, 0.818017<, 814, 0.829483<, 815, 0.8396<, 816, 0.851563<<