
230 Ñ Using the MATLAB Debugger and Profiler
Entries in Pascal’s triangle are indexed by integers. n is the number of rows and k is
the position from the leftmost member of the row. The indices in both directions start
at zero (0), so in the fifth row listed here, C(4, 0) = 1, C(4, 1) = 4, and so on. The val-
ues themselves are computed by the formula C(n, k) = n! / (k! (n-k)!), which is called
a combination. n! denotes the factorial of n, that is, the product n(n-1)(n-2) … (2)(1).
The combinations can be interpreted as the number of ways to choose k elements from a
collection containing n elements. When described in words, C(4, 3) represents the ...