Trigamma function

For Barnes's gamma function of 3 variables, see triple gamma function.

Color representation of the trigamma function, ψ₁(z), in a rectangular region of the complex plane. It is generated using the domain coloring method.

In mathematics, the trigamma function, denoted ψ₁(z), is the second of the polygamma functions, and is defined by

$\psi _{1}(z)={\frac {d^{2}}{dz^{2}}}\ln \Gamma (z)$.

It follows from this definition that

$\psi _{1}(z)={\frac {d}{dz}}\psi (z)$

where ψ(z) is the digamma function. It may also be defined as the sum of the series

$\psi _{1}(z)=\sum _{n=0}^{\infty }{\frac {1}{(z+n)^{2}}},$

making it a special case of the Hurwitz zeta function

$\psi _{1}(z)=\zeta (2,z).$

Note that the last two formulas are valid when 1 − z is not a natural number.

Calculation

A double integral representation, as an alternative to the ones given above, may be derived from the series representation:

$\psi _{1}(z)=\int _{0}^{1}\!\!\int _{0}^{y}{\frac {x^{z-1}}{y(1-x)}}\,dx\,dy$

using the formula for the sum of a geometric series. Integration over y yields:

$\psi _{1}(z)=-\int _{0}^{1}{\frac {x^{z-1}\ln {x}}{1-x}}\,dx$

An asymptotic expansion as a Laurent series is

$\psi _{1}(z)={\frac {1}{z}}+{\frac {1}{2z^{2}}}+\sum _{k=1}^{\infty }{\frac {B_{2k}}{z^{2k+1}}}=\sum _{k=0}^{\infty }{\frac {B_{k}}{z^{k+1}}}$

if we have chosen B₁ = 1/2, i.e. the Bernoulli numbers of the second kind.

Recurrence and reflection formulae

The trigamma function satisfies the recurrence relation

$\psi _{1}(z+1)=\psi _{1}(z)-{\frac {1}{z^{2}}}$

and the reflection formula

$\psi _{1}(1-z)+\psi _{1}(z)={\frac {\pi ^{2}}{\sin ^{2}\pi z}}\,$

which immediately gives the value for z = 1/2: $\psi _{1}({\tfrac {1}{2}})={\tfrac {\pi ^{2}}{2}}$.

Special values

The trigamma function has the following special values:

${\begin{aligned}\psi _{1}\left({\tfrac {1}{4}}\right)&=\pi ^{2}+8G\quad &\psi _{1}\left({\tfrac {1}{2}}\right)&={\frac {\pi ^{2}}{2}}&\psi _{1}(1)&={\frac {\pi ^{2}}{6}}\\[6px]\psi _{1}\left({\tfrac {3}{2}}\right)&={\frac {\pi ^{2}}{2}}-4&\psi _{1}(2)&={\frac {\pi ^{2}}{6}}-1\quad \end{aligned}}$

where G represents Catalan's constant.

There are no roots on the real axis of ψ₁, but there exist infinitely many pairs of roots z_n, z_n for Re z < 0. Each such pair of roots approaches Re z_n = −n + 1/2 quickly and their imaginary part increases slowly logarithmic with n. For example, z₁ = −0.4121345... + 0.5978119...i and z₂ = −1.4455692... + 0.6992608...i are the first two roots with Im(z) > 0.

Its relation to the Clausen function

The digamma function at rational arguments can be expressed in terms of trigonometric functions and logarithm by the digamma theorem. A similar result holds for the trigamma function but the circular functions are replaced by Clausen's function. Namely,

$\psi _{1}\left({\frac {p}{q}}\right)={\frac {\pi ^{2}}{2\sin ^{2}(\pi p/q)}}+2q\sum _{m=1}^{(q-1)/2}\sin \left({\frac {2\pi mp}{q}}\right){\textrm {Cl}}_{2}\left({\frac {2\pi m}{q}}\right).$

Computation and approximation

An easy method to approximate the trigamma function is to take the derivative of the series expansion of the digamma function.

$\psi _{1}(x)\approx {\frac {1}{x}}+{\frac {1}{2x^{2}}}+{\frac {1}{6x^{3}}}-{\frac {1}{30x^{5}}}+{\frac {1}{42x^{7}}}-{\frac {1}{30x^{9}}}+{\frac {5}{66x^{11}}}-{\frac {691}{2730x^{13}}}+{\frac {7}{6x^{15}}}$

Appearance

The trigamma function appears in this surprising sum formula:

$\sum _{n=1}^{\infty }{\frac {n^{2}-{\frac {1}{2}}}{\left(n^{2}+{\frac {1}{2}}\right)^{2}}}\left(\psi _{1}{\bigg (}n-{\frac {i}{\sqrt {2}}}{\bigg )}+\psi _{1}{\bigg (}n+{\frac {i}{\sqrt {2}}}{\bigg )}\right)=-1+{\frac {\sqrt {2}}{4}}\pi \coth {\frac {\pi }{\sqrt {2}}}-{\frac {3\pi ^{2}}{4\sinh ^{2}{\frac {\pi }{\sqrt {2}}}}}+{\frac {\pi ^{4}}{12\sinh ^{4}{\frac {\pi }{\sqrt {2}}}}}\left(5+\cosh \pi {\sqrt {2}}\right).$

See also

• Gamma function
• Digamma function
• Polygamma function
• Catalan's constant

References

• Milton Abramowitz and Irene A. Stegun, Handbook of Mathematical Functions, (1964) Dover Publications, New York. ISBN 0-486-61272-4. See section §6.4
• Eric W. Weisstein. Trigamma Function -- from MathWorld--A Wolfram Web Resource