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Chemistry LibreTexts

M2: Legendre Polynomials

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Each Legendre polynomial Pn(x) is an n=th-degree polynomial. It may be expressed using Rodrigues' formula:

Pn(x)=12nn!dndxn[(x21)n]

That these polynomials satisfy the Legendre differential equation follows by differentiating (n+1) times both sides of the identity

(x21)ddx(x21)n=2nx(x21)n

The first few Legendre polynomials are:

n Pn(x)
0 1
1 x
2 12(3x21)
3 12(5x33x)
4 18(35x430x2+3)
5 18(63x570x3+15x)
6 116(231x6315x4+105x25)
7 116(429x7693x5+315x335x)
8 1128(6435x812012x6+6930x41260x2+35)
9 1128(12155x925740x7+18018x54620x3+315x)
10 1256(46189x10109395x8+90090x630030x4+3465x263)

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M2: Legendre Polynomials is shared under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by LibreTexts.

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