Consider the following problem: Find two numbers whose sum is 23 and whose product is a maximum. (a) Make a table of values, like the following one, so that the sum of the numbers in the first two columns is always 23. On the basis of the evidence in your table, estimate the answer to the problem. (b) Use calculus to solve the problem and compare with your answer to part (a).
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Textbook Solutions for Calculus: Early Transcendentals
Question
The blood vascular system consists of blood vessels (arteries, arterioles, capillaries, and veins) that convey blood from the heart to the organs and back to the heart. This system should work so as to minimize the energy expended by the heart in pumping the blood. In particular, this energy is reduced when the resistance of the blood is lowered. One of Poiseuilles Laws gives the resistance of the blood as where is the length of the blood vessel, is the radius, and is a positive constant determined by the viscosity of the blood. (Poiseuille established this law experimentally, but it also follows from Equation 8.4.2.) The figure shows a main blood ves sel with radius branching at an angle into a smaller vesselwith radius .(a) Use Poiseuilles Law to show that the total resistance of theblood along the path iswhere and are the distances shown in the figure.(b) Prove that this resistance is minimized when(c) Find the optimal branching angle (correct to the nearestdegree) when the radius of the smaller blood vessel is twothirdsthe radius of the larger vessel.
Solution
The first step in solving 4.7 problem number 76 trying to solve the problem we have to refer to the textbook question: The blood vascular system consists of blood vessels (arteries, arterioles, capillaries, and veins) that convey blood from the heart to the organs and back to the heart. This system should work so as to minimize the energy expended by the heart in pumping the blood. In particular, this energy is reduced when the resistance of the blood is lowered. One of Poiseuilles Laws gives the resistance of the blood as where is the length of the blood vessel, is the radius, and is a positive constant determined by the viscosity of the blood. (Poiseuille established this law experimentally, but it also follows from Equation 8.4.2.) The figure shows a main blood ves sel with radius branching at an angle into a smaller vesselwith radius .(a) Use Poiseuilles Law to show that the total resistance of theblood along the path iswhere and are the distances shown in the figure.(b) Prove that this resistance is minimized when(c) Find the optimal branching angle (correct to the nearestdegree) when the radius of the smaller blood vessel is twothirdsthe radius of the larger vessel.
From the textbook chapter Optimization Problems you will find a few key concepts needed to solve this.
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