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The differential was first introduced via an intuitive or heuristic definition by Isaac Newton and furthered by Gottfried Leibniz, who thought of the differential dy as an infinitely small (or infinitesimal) change in the value y of the function, corresponding to an infinitely small change dx in the function's argument x.
In mathematics, the derivative is a fundamental tool that quantifies the sensitivity to change of a function's output with respect to its input. The derivative of a function of a single variable at a chosen input value, when it exists, is the slope of the tangent line to the graph of the function at that point.
The derivative of the function at a point is the slope of the line tangent to the curve at the point. The slope of the constant function is 0, because the tangent line to the constant function is horizontal and its angle is 0.
The exterior derivative is a notion of differentiation of differential forms which generalizes the differential of a function (which is a differential 1-form). Pullback is, in particular, a geometric name for the chain rule for composing a map between manifolds with a differential form on the target manifold.
In calculus, the chain rule is a formula that expresses the derivative of the composition of two differentiable functions f and g in terms of the derivatives of f and g.More precisely, if = is the function such that () = (()) for every x, then the chain rule is, in Lagrange's notation, ′ = ′ (()) ′ (). or, equivalently, ′ = ′ = (′) ′.
In calculus, the inverse function rule is a formula that expresses the derivative of the inverse of a bijective and differentiable function f in terms of the derivative of f. More precisely, if the inverse of f {\displaystyle f} is denoted as f − 1 {\displaystyle f^{-1}} , where f − 1 ( y ) = x {\displaystyle f^{-1}(y)=x} if and only if f ...
In mathematics, matrix calculus is a specialized notation for doing multivariable calculus, especially over spaces of matrices.It collects the various partial derivatives of a single function with respect to many variables, and/or of a multivariate function with respect to a single variable, into vectors and matrices that can be treated as single entities.
For a real-valued function of a single real variable, the derivative of a function at a point generally determines the best linear approximation to the function at that point. Differential calculus and integral calculus are connected by the fundamental theorem of calculus. This states that differentiation is the reverse process to integration.