
198 Introduction to Computational Modeling
FIGURE 15.1: Graph of the equation y = 2x
3
−3x
2
−36x + 14.
that give y value zero. These two values of x are known as the roots of the function.
For higher order polynomial functions, the degree of the polynomial determines the
number of roots of the function. A polynomial function of degree 7 will have 7 roots.
It is not generally feasible to find the roots of polynomial equations of degree
4 or higher by analytical methods. The GSL implements an algorithm that uses an
iterative method to find the approximate locations of roots of polynomials. The GSL
includes library function gsl poly complex solve, that computes ...