How do you find the n-th derivative of a power series?

1 Answer
Sep 12, 2014

If f(x)=sum_{k=0}^infty c_kx^k, then
f^{(n)}(x)=sum_{k=n}^infty k(k-1)(k-2)cdots(k-n+1)c_kx^{k-n}

By taking the derivative term by term,
f'(x)=sum_{k=1}^infty kc_kx^{k-1}
f''(x)=sum_{k=2}^infty k(k-1)c_kx^{k-2}
f'''(x)=sum_{k=3}^infty k(k-1)(k-2)c_kx^{k-3}
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f^{(n)}(x)=sum_{k=n}^infty k(k-1)(k-2)cdots(k-n+1)c_kx^{k-n}