Find the term independent of x in the expansion of (x^4-2/3x)^100

1 answer

To find the term independent of x, we need to focus on the constant term in the expansion. The constant term is obtained by choosing the x terms which cancel each other out when multiplied together.

We can represent the constant term as:

C(100, k) * (x^4)^k * (-2/3x)^(100-k)

where k is the number of times we choose the x^4 term out of the 100 brackets.

For the constant term, we need to have k times the x^4 term and (100-k) times the -2/3x term.

Therefore, we need to solve the following equation:

4k - (2/3)(100-k) = 0

simplifying, we get:

k = 25

So the constant term is:

C(100,25) * (x^4)^25 * (-2/3x)^(75)

= C(100,25) * x^100 * (-2/3)^75

Since we are only interested in the constant term, we can ignore the x^100 term and we are left with:

C(100,25) * (-2/3)^75

which is a numerical value and is the term independent of x.