Too many cosines!

Calculus Level 5

n = 2 cos π 2 n \large \prod_{n=2}^\infty \cos \dfrac{ \pi}{2^n}

The infinite product above has a closed form. Evaluate this closed form.

Give your answer to 3 decimal places.


The answer is 0.637.

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2 solutions

f ( x ) = n = 2 x cos ( π 2 n ) f(x) = \displaystyle \prod_{n=2}^{x} \cos\left(\dfrac{\pi}{2^{n}}\right)
f ( x ) = sin ( π 2 ) 2 x sin ( π 2 x + 1 ) = 2 x sin ( π 2 x + 1 ) f(x) = \displaystyle \dfrac{\sin\left(\frac{\pi}{2}\right)}{2^{x}\sin\left(\dfrac{\pi}{2^{x+1}}\right)} = \dfrac{2^{-x}}{\sin\left(\dfrac{\pi}{2^{x+1}}\right)}
lim x f ( x ) = 2 π 0.636 \displaystyle \lim_{ x \to \infty}f(x) = \dfrac{2}{\pi} \approx 0.636

This is a famous formula represented as,
2 π = 1 2 2 + 1 2 2 \dfrac{2}{\pi} = \dfrac{1}{\sqrt{2}}\sqrt{\dfrac{\sqrt{2} +1}{2\sqrt{2}}} \ldots known as Walli's formula if I am not wrong.

Genius answer!

Ραμών Αδάλια - 5 years, 1 month ago

did exactly the same!!

Arunava Das - 3 years, 1 month ago

That formula is actually Viète's formula for pi. A nice proof of the Wallis product for pi can be found here https://brilliant.org/problems/wallis-product-proof/?ref_id=1493253

John Ross - 3 years, 1 month ago
John Ross
Apr 26, 2018

n = 2 x cos ( π 2 n ) = 1 2 x 1 sin π 2 x \prod_{n=2}^{x} \cos\left(\dfrac{\pi}{2^{n}}\right)=\frac{1}{2^{x-1} \sin\frac{\pi}{2^x}} We can show this by induction. The base case of x = 2 x=2 is straightforward. For the iterative step, we can use the double angle identity for sin(x). n = 2 x + 1 cos ( π 2 n ) = cos π 2 x + 1 n = 2 x cos ( π 2 n ) = cos ( π 2 x + 1 ) 1 2 x 1 sin π 2 x = 1 2 x sin π 2 x + 1 \prod_{n=2}^{x+1} \cos\left(\dfrac{\pi}{2^{n}}\right)= \cos\frac{\pi}{2^{x+1}} \prod_{n=2}^{x} \cos\left(\dfrac{\pi}{2^{n}}\right)= \cos\left(\dfrac{\pi}{2^{x+1}}\right) \frac{1}{2^{x-1} \sin\frac{\pi}{2^x}}=\frac{1}{2^{x} \sin\frac{\pi}{2^{x+1}}} This completes the induction. Taking the limit as x goes to infinity of the product that we just proved gives us n = 2 cos ( π 2 n ) = 2 π \prod_{n=2}^{\infty} \cos\left(\dfrac{\pi}{2^{n}}\right)=\dfrac {2}{\pi}

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