Mathematical Functions and their Approximations is an updated version of the Applied Mathematics Series 55 Handbook based on the 1954 Conference on Mathematical Tables, held at Cambridge, Massachusetts. The aim of the conference is to determine the need for mathematical tables in view of the availability of high speed computing machinery. This work is composed of 14 chapters that cover the machinery for the expansion of the generalized hypergeometric function and other functions in infinite series of Jacobi and Chebyshev polynomials of the first kind. Numerical coefficients for Chebyshev expansions of the more common functions are tabulated. Other chapters contain polynomial and rational approximations for certain class of G-functions, the coefficients in the early polynomials of these rational approximations, and the Padé approximations for many of the elementary functions and the incomplete gamma functions. The remaining chapters describe the development of analytic approximations and expansions. This book will prove useful to mathematicians, advance mathematics students, and researchers.

Chebyshev polynomials crop up in virtually every area of numerical analysis, and they hold particular importance in recent advances in subjects such as orthogonal polynomials, polynomial approximation, numerical integration, and spectral methods. Yet no book dedicated to Chebyshev polynomials has been published since 1990, and even that work focuse

Error in function evaluation computations -- Square-root and cube-root evaluation -- Reducing the argument range -- Polynomial evaluation methods -- Minimax polynomial approximations -- Chebyshev polynomials and Chebyshev series -- Various polynomial approximation methods -- Rational-function evaluation methods -- Minimax rational approximations -- Various rational approximation methods -- Asymptotic expansions.

Completely revised text focuses on use of spectral methods to solve boundary value, eigenvalue, and time-dependent problems, but also covers Hermite, Laguerre, rational Chebyshev, sinc, and spherical harmonic functions, as well as cardinal functions, linear eigenvalue problems, matrix-solving methods, coordinate transformations, methods for unbounded intervals, spherical and cylindrical geometry, and much more. 7 Appendices. Glossary. Bibliography. Index. Over 160 text figures.