Discriminant

In algebra, the discriminant of a polynomial is an expression which gives

information about the nature of the polynomial's roots. For example, the discriminant
of the quadratic polynomial

is

Here, if > 0, the polynomial has two real roots, if = 0, the polynomial has one real
root, and if < 0, the polynomial has no real roots. The discriminant of the cubic
polynomial

is

The discriminant of a quartic is significantly longer, with 16 terms.

A polynomial has a multiple root (i.e. a root with multiplicity greater than one) in the
complex numbers if and only if its discriminant is zero.
The concept also applies if the polynomial has coefficients in a field which is not
contained in the complex numbers. In this case, the discriminant vanishes if and only
if the polynomial has a multiple root in its splitting field.

Definition
Formula
In terms of the roots, the discriminant is given by

where an is the leading coefficient and r1,...,rn are the roots (counting multiplicity) of
the polynomial in some splitting field. It is the square of the Vandermonde
polynomial.

As the discriminant is a symmetric function in the roots, it can also be expressed in

terms of the coefficients of the polynomial, since the coefficients are the elementary
symmetric polynomials in the roots; such a formula is given below.
Expressing the discriminant in terms of the roots makes its key property clear, namely
that it vanishes if and only if there is a repeated root, but does not allow it to be
calculated without factoring a polynomial, after which the information it provides is
redundant (if one has the roots, one can tell if there are any duplicates). Hence the
formula in terms of the coefficients allows the nature of the roots to be determined
without factoring the polynomial.

Generalizations
The concept of discriminant has been generalized to other algebraic structures besides
polynomials of one variable, including conic sections, quadratic forms, and algebraic
number fields. Discriminants in algebraic number theory are closely related, and
contain information about ramification. In fact, the more geometric types of
ramification are also related to more abstract types of discriminant, making this a
central algebraic idea in many applications.

Formula
The quadratic polynomial

has discriminant

the cubic polynomial

has discriminant

These are homogeneous polynomials in the coefficients, respectively of degree 2 and

4. Simpler polynomials have simpler expressions for their discriminants. For example,
the monic quadratic polynomial

has discriminant

the monic cubic polynomial

has discriminant

the monic cubic polynomial without quadratic term

has discriminant

In terms of the roots, these are homogeneous polynomials of degree 2 (quadratic) and
6 (cubic).

Homogeneity
The discriminant is a homogeneous polynomial in the coefficients; for monic
polynomials, it is a homogeneous polynomial in the roots.
In the coefficients, the discriminant is homogeneous of degree 2n 2; this can be
seen two ways. In terms of the roots-and-leading-term formula, multiplying all the
coefficients by does not change the roots, but multiplies the leading term by . In
terms of the formula as a determinant of a
matrix divided by
an, the determinant of the matrix is homogeneous of degree 2n 1 in the entries,
and dividing by an makes the degree 2n 2; explicitly, multiplying the coefficients
by multiplies all entries of the matrix by , hence multiplies the determinant by 2n
1
.
For a monic polynomial, the discriminant is a polynomial in the roots alone (as the
term is one), and is of degree n(n
in the product, each squared.

1) in the roots, as there are

an

terms

These are connected as the coefficients are elementary symmetric polynomials in the
roots (hence individually homogeneous).
This description restricts the possible terms in the discriminant each term consists of
2n 2 coefficients, with total degree (as symmetric polynomials in the roots) n(n
1), with each coefficient having degree at most n. These thus correspond to partitions
of n(n 1) into at most 2n 2 (positive) parts of size at most n. For the quadratic,
these are partitions of 2 into at most 2 parts of size at most 2: b2 = bb:1 + 1 and

ac:0 + 2. For the cubic, these are partitions of 6 into at most 4 parts of size at most
3, all of which occur:

While this approach gives the possible terms, it does not determine the coefficients.

Quadratic formula
The quadratic polynomial P(x) = ax2 + bx + c has discriminant D = b2 4ac, which is
the quantity under the square root sign in the quadratic formula. For real numbers a, b,
c, one has:

When D > 0 , P(x) has two distinct real roots

and its graph crosses the x-axis twice.

When D = 0, P(x) has two coincident real roots

and its graph is tangent to the x-axis.

When D < 0 , P(x) has no real roots, and its graph lies strictly above or below
the x-axis.

An alternative way to understand the discriminant of a quadratic is to use the

characterization as "vanishes if and only if the polynomial has a repeated root". In that
case the polynomial is (x r)2 = x2 2rx + r2. The coefficients then satisfy (
2r)2 = 4(r2), so b2 = 4c, and a monic quadratic has a repeated root if and only if
this is the case, in which case the root is r = b / 2. Putting both terms on one side
and including a leading coefficient yields b2 4ac.

Discriminant of a polynomial
To find the formula for the discriminant of a polynomial in terms of its coefficients, it
is easiest to introduce the resultant. Just as the discriminant of a single polynomial is
the product of the squares of the difference between the distinct roots of a polynomial,
the resultant of two polynomials is the product of the differences between their roots,
and just as the discriminant vanishes if and only if the polynomial has a repeated root,
the resultant vanishes if and only if the two polynomials share a root.

Since a polynomial p(x) has a repeated root if and only if it shares a root with its
derivative p'(x), the discriminant D(p) and the resultant R(p,p') both have the
property that they vanish if and only if p has a repeated root, and they have almost the
same degree (the degree of the resultant is one greater than the degree of the
discriminant) and thus are equal up to a factor of degree one.
The benefit of the resultant is that it can be computed as a determinant, namely as the
determinant of the Sylvester matrix, a (2n 1)(2n 1) matrix.
The discriminant of the general polynomial

is, up to a factor, equal to the determinant of the (2n 1)(2n 1) Sylvester matrix:

The discriminant D(p) of p(x) is now given by the formula

For example, in the case n = 4, the above determinant is

The discriminant of the degree 4 polynomial is then obtained from this determinant
upon dividing by a4.
In terms of the roots, the discriminant is equal to

where r1, ..., rn are the complex roots (counting multiplicity) of the polynomial p(x):

This second expression makes it clear that, p has a multiple root if and only if the
discriminant is zero. (This multiple root can be complex.)
The discriminant can be defined for polynomials over arbitrary fields, in exactly the
same fashion as above. The product formula involving the roots ri remains valid; the
roots have to be taken in some splitting field of the polynomial.

Nature of the roots

The discriminant gives additional information on the nature of the roots beyond
simply whether there are any repeated roots: it also gives information on whether the
roots are real or complex, and rational or irrational. More formally, it gives
information on whether the roots are in the field over which the polynomial is
defined, or are in an extension field, and hence whether the polynomial factors over
the field of coefficients. This is most transparent and easily stated for quadratic and
cubic polynomials; for polynomials of degree 4 or higher this is more difficult to
state.

Quadratic
Because the quadratic formula expressed the roots of a quadratic polynomial as a
rational function in terms of the square root of the discriminant, the roots of a
quadratic polynomial are in the same field as the coefficients if and only if the
discriminant is a square in the field of coefficients: in other words, the polynomial
factors over the field of coefficients if and only if the discriminant is a square.
Thus in particular for a quadratic polynomial with real coefficients, a real number has
real square roots if and only if it is nonnegative, and these roots are distinct if and
only if it is positive (not zero). Thus

> 0: 2 distinct real roots: factors over the reals;

< 0: 2 distinct complex roots (complex conjugate), does not factor over the
reals;

= 0: 1 real root with multiplicity 2: factors over the reals as a square.

Further, for a quadratic polynomial with rational coefficients, it factors over the
rationals if and only the if the discriminant which is necessarily a rational number,
being a polynomial in the coefficients is in fact a square.

Cubic
For a cubic polynomial, the discriminant reflects the nature of the roots as follows:

> 0: the equation has 3 distinct real roots;

< 0, the equation has 1 real root and 2 complex conjugate roots;

= 0: at least 2 roots coincide, and they are all real.

It may be that the equation has a double real root and another distinct single
real root; alternatively, all three roots coincide yielding a triple real root.

To decide if a polynomial has a triple root or not, one may compute the discriminant
of a cubic and the discriminant of its derivative it has a triple root if and only if both
of these vanish; equivalently, if and only if the resultants R(p,p') and R(p,p'') (or
R(p',p'')) vanish. Note that two polynomials are required, because the set of cubics
with repeated roots is a codimension 2 subvariety of the projective space of all cubics,
and thus by dimension counting one needs two polynomials to determine this set.
More directly, there is a 1-parameter set of cubics with a triple root the parameter
being the root while there is a 3-parameter set of cubics with possibly different
roots. Explicitly, the cubics with a triple root are given parametrically as (x r)3 =
x3 3rx2 + 3r2x r3, so the coefficients are ( 3r,3r2, r3) up to scale, the
twisted cubic.

Discriminant of a conic section

For a conic section defined by the real polynomial:

the discriminant is equal to

and determines the shape of the conic section. If the discriminant is less than 0, the
equation is of an ellipse or a circle. If the discriminant equals 0, the equation is that of
a parabola. If the discriminant is greater than 0, the equation is that of a hyperbola.
This formula will not work for degenerate cases (when the polynomial factors).

Discriminant of a quadratic form

There is a substantive generalization to quadratic forms Q over any field K of
characteristic 2.

Given a quadratic form Q, the discriminant is the determinant of a symmetric matrix

S for Q.
Change of variables by a matrix A changes the matrix of the symmetric form by
ATSA, which has determinant (detA)2detS, so under change of variables, the
discriminant changes by a non-zero square, and thus the class of the discriminant is
well-defined in K/(K*)2, i.e., up to non-zero squares. See also quadratic residue.
Less intrinsically, by a theorem of Jacobi quadratic forms on
diagonal form as

Kn can be expressed in

or more generally quadratic forms on V as a sum

where the Li are linear forms and 1 i n where n is the number of variables. Then
the discriminant is the product of the ai, which is well-defined as a class in K/(K*)2.
For K=R, the real numbers, (R*)2 is the positive real numbers (any positive number is
a square of a non-zero number), and thus the quotient R/(R*)2 has three elements:
positive, zero, and negative.
For K=C, the complex numbers, (C*)2 is the non-zero complex numbers (any complex
number is a square), and thus the quotient C/(C*)2 has two elements: non-zero and
zero.
This definition generalizes the discriminant of a quadratic polynomial, as the
polynomial ax2 + bx + c homogenizes to the quadratic form aX2 + bXY + cY2,
which has symmetric matrix

whose determinant is ac

(b / 2)2 = ac b2 / 4. Up to a factor of -4, this is b2

4ac.
The invariance of the class of the discriminant of a real form (positive, zero, or
negative) corresponds to the corresponding conic section being an ellipse, parabola, or
hyperbola.

Discriminant of an algebraic number field

Discriminant of a differentiable function

In differential topology, the discriminant of a differentiable function f is the same as

the set of critical values of f. The discriminant in this sense is somewhat related to the
discriminant of a polynomial; for example, if f(x)=ax2+bx+c is a quadratic (a0), then
the critical value of f will be
discriminant of a quadratic polynomial

which is (up to a constant) equal to the