In a broad spectrum of physics and engineering applications, transcendental equations have to be solved in order to determine their roots. Exact and explicit algebraic expression of solutions to such equations is, in general, impossible. Analytical approximate solutions to two kinds of transcendental equations with wide applications are presented. These approximate root formulas are systematically established by using the Padé approximant and show high accuracy. As an application of the proposed approximations, a highly accurate expression of the effective mass of the spring for a spring-mass system is obtained. The method described in this paper is also applied to other transcendental equations in physics and engineering applications.
A second-order Newton method is presented to construct analytical approximate solutions to a nonlinear pseudo-oscillator in which the restoring force is inversely proportional to the dependent variable. The nonlinear equation is first expressed in a specific form, and it is then solved in two steps, a predictor and a corrector step. In each step, the harmonic balance method is used in an appropriate manner to obtain a set of linear algebraic equations. With only one simple second-order Newton iteration step, a short, explicit, and highly accurate analytical approximate solution can be derived. The approximate solutions are valid for all amplitudes of the pseudo-oscillator. Furthermore, the method incorporates second-order Taylor expansion in a natural way, and it is of significant faster convergence rate.
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