Given a quadratic inequality of the form , with . Select the correct values for , and of a inequality with a solution set , where .
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For any given n the quadratic inequality − x 2 + 2 n x − n 2 ≥ 0 has a solution set consisting of only the number n . So L = { n } . Example n = 3 then the inequality becomes: − x 2 + 6 x − 9 ≥ 0 using the quadratic formula we get: x = − 2 − 6 ± 3 6 − 4 × − 1 × 9 , which simplifies to x = x = − 2 − 6 = 3 . The fact that a < 0 has to be true becomes clear if we graph a quadratic function: a < 0 has to be true in order for the function to be closed at the top otherwise the inequality a x 2 + b x + c ≥ 0 could not have only one single solution. For the other coefficients let's recall that a quadratic equation only consists of one solution if D = b 2 − 4 a c = 0 so if we plug in our values: 4 n 2 − 4 × − 1 × − n 2 = 0 = 4 n 2 − 4 n 2 = 0 . So a = − 1 , b = 2 n and c = − n 2 is the only given combination that works in this case.