Thursday, 26 October 2017

complex analysis - Why the integral intiinftynftydxfrac1(xi)2frac1(x+i)2 is not zero?



This might be silly but I am almost pulling my hair.



Why the following integral (along the real axis) is not zero:
dx1(xi)21(x+i)2



The integral has no residues and can be completed by a semicircle either in the upper complex plane or the lower complex plane. According to the residue theorem, it should be zero. (Mathematica says it's π/2)




What's wrong with my logic here?



Edit:
I was somehow given the wrong impression that high-order poles does not contribute to the residue.


Answer



Oh, but the residue theorem does give a nonzero value. There are second-order poles at ±i, and the integrand's residue at such a pole is limx±iddx1(x±i)2=2(±2i)3=i4.

As I think your only mistake was in misunderstanding how higher-order poles provide residues, I'll leave it to you to understand why we can calculate the integral from the pole at i alone, viz.Rdx(x2+1)2=2πi×i4=π2,
just as your software said. (It can also be proven with x=tant.)



Edit: let me motivate the way higher-order poles work. Suppose f(c) is neither 0 nor infinite. Then f(z)(zc)ndz=fn1(c)(n1)!(zc)dz=2πilimzcfn1(z)(n1)!.


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