Trigonometric function

In mathematics, the trigonometric functions are functions of an angle, important when studying triangles and modeling periodic phenomena. They are commonly defined as ratios of two sides of a right triangle containing the angle, and can equivalently be defined as the lengths of various line segments from a unit circle. More modern definitions express them as infinite series or as solutions of certain differential equations, allowing their extension to positive and negative values and even to complex numbers. All of these approaches will be presented below.

References

• Carl B. Boyer, A History of Mathematics, 2nd ed. (Wiley, New York, 1991).
• Eli Maor, Trigonometric Delights (Princeton Univ. Press, 1998).
• "Trigonometric functions", MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive.
• Tristan Needham, Visual Complex Analysis, (Oxford University Press, 2000), ISBN 0198534469 Book website
• Vitit Kantabutra, "On hardware for computing exponential and trigonometric functions," IEEE Trans. Computers 45 (3), 328-339 (1996).