Aus Online Mathematik Brückenkurs 1

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Introduction

There is a variety of trigonometric formulas to use if one wishes to transform between the sine, cosine or tangent for an angle or multiples of an angle. They are usually known as the trigonometric identities, since they only lead to different ways to describe a single expression using a variety of trigonometric functions. Here we will give some of these trigonometric relationships. There are many more than we can deal with in this course. Most can be derived from the so-called Pythagorean identity and the addition and subtraction formulas or identities (see below), which are important to know by heart.

The Pythagorean identity

This identity is the most basic, but is in fact nothing more than Pythagorean theorem, applied to the unit circle. The right-angled triangle on the right shows that Vorlage:Displayed math which is usually written as \displaystyle \sin^2\!v + \cos^2\!v = 1.

Symmetries

With the help of the unit circle and reflection, and exploiting the symmetries of the trigonometric functions one obtains a large amount of relationships between the cosine and sine functions.

Instead of trying to learn all of these relationships by heart, it might be better to learn how to derive them from the unit circle.

Reflection in the x-axis

When an angle \displaystyle v is reflected in the x-axis it becomes\displaystyle -v. Reflection does not affect the x- coordinate while the y-coordinate changes sign Vorlage:Displayed math

Reflection in the y-axis

Reflection in the y-axis changes the angle \displaystyle v to \displaystyle \pi-v (the reflection makes an angle \displaystyle v with the negative x-axis). Reflection does not affect the y-coordinate while the x-coordinate changes sign Vorlage:Displayed math

Reflection in the line y = x

The angle \displaystyle v changes to \displaystyle \pi/2 - v ( the reflection makes an angle \displaystyle v with the positive y-axis). Reflection causes the x- and y-coordinates to change places Vorlage:Displayed math

Rotation by an angle of \displaystyle \mathbf{\pi/2}

A rotation \displaystyle \pi/2 of the angle \displaystyle v means that the angle becomes \displaystyle v+\pi/2. The rotation turns the x-coordinate into the new y-coordinate and the y-coordinates turns into the new x-coordinate though with the opposite sign Vorlage:Displayed math

Alternatively, one can get these relationships by reflecting and / or displacing graphs. For instance, if we want to have a formula in which \displaystyle \cos v is expressed in terms of a sine one can displace the graph for cosine to fit the sine curve. This can be done in several ways, but the most natural is to write \displaystyle \cos v = \sin (v + \pi / 2). To avoid mistakes, one can check that this is true for several different values of \displaystyle v.

Check: \displaystyle \ \cos 0 = \sin (0 + \pi / 2)=1.

The addition and subtraction formulas and double-angle and half-angle formulas

One often needs to deal with expressions in which two or more angles are involved, such as \displaystyle \sin(u+v). One will then need the so-called "addition formulas" . For sine and cosine the formulas are

If one wants to know the sine or cosine of a double angle, that is \displaystyle \sin 2v or \displaystyle \cos 2v, one can write these expressions as \displaystyle \sin(v + v) or \displaystyle \cos(v + v) and use the addition formulas above and get the double-angle formulas

From these relationships, one can then get the formulas for half angles. By replacing \displaystyle 2v by \displaystyle v, and consequently \displaystyle v by \displaystyle v/2, in the formula for \displaystyle \cos 2v one gets that Vorlage:Displayed math

If we want a formula for \displaystyle \sin(v/2) we use the Pythagorean identity to get rid of \displaystyle \cos^2(v/2) Vorlage:Displayed math i.e.

Similarly, we can use the Pythagorean identity to get rid of \displaystyle \sin^2(v/2). Then we will have instead

Exercises