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Course: AP®︎/College Calculus BC > Unit 6
Lesson 4: The fundamental theorem of calculus and accumulation functions- The fundamental theorem of calculus and accumulation functions
- Functions defined by definite integrals (accumulation functions)
- Functions defined by definite integrals (accumulation functions)
- Finding derivative with fundamental theorem of calculus
- Finding derivative with fundamental theorem of calculus
- Finding derivative with fundamental theorem of calculus: chain rule
- Finding derivative with fundamental theorem of calculus: chain rule
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Finding derivative with fundamental theorem of calculus
The Fundamental Theorem of Calculus tells us that the derivative of the definite integral from 𝘢 to 𝘹 of ƒ(𝑡)𝘥𝑡 is ƒ(𝘹), provided that ƒ is continuous. See how this can be used to evaluate the derivative of accumulation functions. Created by Sal Khan.
Video transcript
- [Instructor] Let's say that
we have the function g of x, and it is equal to the
definite integral from 19 to x of the cube root of t dt. And what I'm curious about finding or trying to figure out
is, what is g prime of 27? What is that equal to? Pause this video and
try to think about it, and I'll give you a little bit of a hint. Think about the second
fundamental theorem of calculus. All right, now let's
work on this together. So we wanna figure out what g prime, we could try to figure
out what g prime of x is, and then evaluate that at 27, and the best way that I
can think about doing that is by taking the derivative of
both sides of this equation. So let's take the derivative
of both sides of that equation. So the left-hand side,
we'll take the derivative with respect to x of g of x, and the right-hand side, the
derivative with respect to x of all of this business. Now, the left-hand side is
pretty straight forward. The derivative with
respect to x of g of x, that's just going to be g prime of x, but what is the right-hand
side going to be equal to? Well, that's where the
second fundamental theorem of calculus is useful. I'll write it right over here. Second fundamental, I'll
abbreviate a little bit, theorem of calculus. It tells us, let's say we have
some function capital F of x, and it's equal to the
definite integral from a, sum constant a to x of
lowercase f of t dt. The second fundamental
theorem of calculus tells us that if our lowercase f, if lowercase f is continuous
on the interval from a to x, so I'll write it this way, on the closed interval from a to x, then the derivative of our capital f of x, so capital F prime of x
is just going to be equal to our inner function f
evaluated at x instead of t is going to become lowercase f of x. Now, I know when you first saw this, you thought that, "Hey, this
might be some cryptic thing "that you might not use too often." Well, we're gonna see that
it's actually very, very useful and even in the future, and
some of you might already know, there's multiple ways to try to think about a definite
integral like this, and you'll learn it in the future. But this can be extremely simplifying, especially if you have a hairy
definite integral like this, and so this just tells us,
hey, look, the derivative with respect to x of all of this business, first we have to check
that our inner function, which would be analogous
to our lowercase f here, is this continuous on the
interval from 19 to x? Well, no matter what x is, this is going to be
continuous over that interval, because this is continuous for all x's, and so we meet this first
condition or our major condition, and so then we can just say, all right, then the derivative of all of this is just going to be this inner
function replacing t with x. So we're going to get the cube root, instead of the cube root of t, you're gonna get the cube root of x. And so we can go back to
our original question, what is g prime of 27
going to be equal to? Well, it's going to be equal
to the cube root of 27, which is of course equal
to three, and we're done.