# Progressions

Arithmetic and Geometric progressions.

### Progressions

Find the sum of the following progression from 1st term to 1000th term.
3, 5/3, 7/5, 9/7, 11/9, 13/11……..
Also, what is the type of the progression ?
Guest

### Re: Progressions

I doubt there is a simple closed form for that sum. Will you accept an approximation?

First subtract 1 from each term and add those separately.

$$\sum_{k=1}^{1000 }1 + \sum_{k=1}^{1000 }\frac{2}{2k-1}$$

The first term is just 1000. The second term is the sum of two well known series, the harmonic series $$H(2000) = 1 + \frac{1}{2}+ \frac{1}{3}+\frac{1}{4}+\frac{1}{5}+ ...+\frac{1}{1999}+ \frac{1}{2000}$$

and the alternating series $$A(2000) = 1 - \frac{1}{2}+\frac{1}{3}-\frac{1}{4}+\frac{1}{5} ... +\frac{1}{1999}- \frac{1}{2000}$$.

The harmonic series is well approximated by $$H(n) =\ln n + \gamma$$ where $$\gamma \approx0.577$$ is Euler's constant.

The alternating harmonic series converges to $$\ln 2$$. It converges slowly, but with 2000 terms the approximation is good for 3 decimals.

So your sum is about $$1000+ \ln 2000 + 0.577 + \ln 2$$.

phw

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