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Difficulty Level: Basic Created by: CK-12
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Suppose your teacher has instructed the members of your math class to work in pairs, and she has asked you to find the length of a line segment. You get \begin{align*}\sqrt{2x+6}\end{align*} units for the length, and your partner gets 10 units. You ask your teacher who is right, and she says both of you are right! Can you set up an equation and solve for \begin{align*}x\end{align*} in this case? How would you do it? In this Concept, you'll learn to solve radical equations like the one you would set up here.

### Guidance

Solving radical equations is no different from solving linear or quadratic equations. Before you can begin to solve a radical equation, you must know how to cancel the radical. To do that, you must know its inverse.

Original Operation Inverse Operation
Cube Root Cubing (to the third power)
Square Root Squaring (to the second power)
Fourth Root Fourth power
\begin{align*}n\end{align*}th” Root \begin{align*}n\end{align*}th” power

To solve a radical equation, you apply the solving equation steps you learned in previous Concepts, including the inverse operations for roots.

#### Example A

Solve \begin{align*}\sqrt{2x-1}=5\end{align*}.

Solution:

The first operation that must be removed is the square root. Square both sides.

\begin{align*}\left ( \sqrt{2x-1} \right )^2&=5^2\\ 2x-1&=25\\ 2x&=26\\ x&=13\end{align*}

Remember to check your answer by substituting it into the original problem to see if it makes sense.

Extraneous Solutions

Not every solution of a radical equation will check in the original problem. This is called an extraneous solution. This means you can find a solution using algebra, but it will not work when checked. This is because of the rule in a previous Concept:

\begin{align*}\sqrt[n]{x}\end{align*} is undefined when \begin{align*}n\end{align*} is an even whole number and \begin{align*}x<0\end{align*},

or, in words, even roots of negative numbers are undefined.

#### Example B

Solve \begin{align*}\sqrt{x-3}-\sqrt{x}=1\end{align*}.

Solution:

\begin{align*}\text{Isolate one of the radical expressions}. \qquad \ \sqrt{x-3}&=\sqrt{x}+1\\ \text{Square both sides}. \quad \left ( \sqrt{x-3} \right )^2 & = \left ( \sqrt{x}+1 \right )^2\\ \text{Remove parentheses}. \qquad \quad \ x-3&=\left ( \sqrt{x} \right )^2 + 2\sqrt{x}+1\\ \text{Simplify}. \qquad \quad \ x-3&=x+2\sqrt{x}+1\\ \text{Now isolate the remaining radical}. \qquad \qquad -4&=2\sqrt{x}\\ \text{Divide all terms by} \ 2. \qquad \qquad -2 &= \sqrt{x}\\ \text{Square both sides}. \qquad \qquad \quad \ x&=4\end{align*}

Check: \begin{align*}\sqrt{4-3} \stackrel{?}{=} \sqrt{4}+1\Rightarrow \sqrt{1} \stackrel{?}{=} 2+1 \Rightarrow 1\neq 3 \end{align*}. The solution does not check out. The equation has no real solutions. Therefore, \begin{align*}x=4\end{align*} is an extraneous solution.

#### Example C

A sphere has a volume of \begin{align*}456 \ cm^3\end{align*}. If the radius of the sphere is increased by 2 cm, what is the new volume of the sphere?

Solution:

1. Define variables. Let \begin{align*}R=\end{align*} the radius of the sphere.
2. Find an equation. The volume of a sphere is given by the formula: \begin{align*}V=\frac{4}{3}\pi r^3\end{align*}.

By substituting 456 for the volume variable, the equation becomes \begin{align*}456=\frac{4}{3} \pi r^3\end{align*}.

\begin{align*}\text{Multiply by} \ 3: \qquad \quad 1368 &= 4\pi r^3\\ \text{Divide by} \ 4\pi: \qquad 108.92&=r^3\\ \text{Take the cube root of each side:} \qquad \qquad \ r&=\sqrt[3]{108.92} \Rightarrow r = 4.776 \ cm\\ \text{The new radius is 2 centimeters more:} \qquad \qquad \ r &= 6.776 \ cm\\ \text{The new volume is}: \qquad \qquad V &= \frac{4}{3}\pi (6.776)^3 = 1302.5 \ cm^3\end{align*}

Check by substituting the values of the radii into the volume formula.

\begin{align*}V=\frac{4}{3}\pi r^3=\frac{4}{3}\pi (4.776)^3=456 \ cm^3\end{align*}. The solution checks out.

### Guided Practice

Solve \begin{align*}\sqrt{x+15}=\sqrt{3x-3}\end{align*}.

Solution:

Begin by canceling the square roots by squaring both sides.

\begin{align*}\left ( \sqrt{x+15} \right )^2&=\left ( \sqrt{3x-3} \right )^2\\ x+15&=3x-3\\ \text{Isolate the} \ x-\text{variable}: \qquad \qquad 18 & = 2x\\ x&=9\end{align*}

Check the solution: \begin{align*}\sqrt{9+15}=\sqrt{3(9)-3} \rightarrow \sqrt{24}=\sqrt{24}\end{align*}. The solution checks.

### Practice

Sample explanations for some of the practice exercises below are available by viewing the following videos. Note that there is not always a match between the number of the practice exercise in the videos and the number of the practice exercise listed in the following exercise set. However, the practice exercise is the same in both. CK-12 Basic Algebra: Extraneous Solutions to Radical Equations (11:10)

In 1-16, find the solution to each of the following radical equations. Identify extraneous solutions.

1. \begin{align*}\sqrt{x+2}-2=0\end{align*}
2. \begin{align*}\sqrt{3x-1}=5\end{align*}
3. \begin{align*}2\sqrt{4-3x}+3=0\end{align*}
4. \begin{align*}\sqrt[3]{x-3}=1\end{align*}
5. \begin{align*}\sqrt[4]{x^2-9}=2\end{align*}
6. \begin{align*}\sqrt[3]{-2-5x}+3=0\end{align*}
7. \begin{align*}\sqrt{x}=x-6\end{align*}
8. \begin{align*}\sqrt{x^2-5x}-6=0\end{align*}
9. \begin{align*}\sqrt{(x+1)(x-3)}=x\end{align*}
10. \begin{align*}\sqrt{x+6}=x+4\end{align*}
11. \begin{align*}\sqrt{x}=\sqrt{x-9}+1\end{align*}
12. \begin{align*}\sqrt{3x+4}=-6\end{align*}
13. \begin{align*}\sqrt{10-5x}+\sqrt{1-x}=7\end{align*}
14. \begin{align*}\sqrt{2x-2}-2\sqrt{x}+2=0\end{align*}
15. \begin{align*}\sqrt{2x+5}-3\sqrt{2x-3}=\sqrt{2-x}\end{align*}
16. \begin{align*}3\sqrt{x}-9=\sqrt{2x-14}\end{align*}
17. The area of a triangle is \begin{align*}24 \ in^2\end{align*} and the height of the triangle is twice as long and the base. What are the base and the height of the triangle?
18. The volume of a square pyramid is given by the formula \begin{align*}V=\frac{A(h)}{3}\end{align*}, where \begin{align*}A=\end{align*} area of the base and \begin{align*}h=\end{align*} height of the pyramid. The volume of a square pyramid is 1,600 cubic meters. If its height is 10 meters, find the area of its base.
19. The volume of a cylinder is \begin{align*}245 \ cm^3\end{align*} and the height of the cylinder is one-third the diameter of the cylinder's base. The diameter of the cylinder is kept the same, but the height of the cylinder is increased by two centimeters. What is the volume of the new cylinder? \begin{align*}(\text{Volume} = \pi r^2 \cdot h)\end{align*}
20. The height of a golf ball as it travels through the air is given by the equation \begin{align*}h=-16t^2+256\end{align*}. Find the time when the ball is at a height of 120 feet.

Mixed Review

1. Joy sells two types of yarn: wool and synthetic. Wool is $12 per skein and synthetic is$9 per skein. If Joy sold 16 skeins of synthetic and collected a total of \$432, how many skeins of wool did she sell?
2. Solve \begin{align*}16 \ge |x-4|\end{align*}.
3. Graph the solution: \begin{align*}\begin{cases}y \le 2x-4\\ y>-\frac{1}{4} x+6\end{cases}\end{align*}.
4. You randomly point to a day in the month of February, 2011. What is the probability your finger lands on a Monday?
5. Carbon-14 has a half life of 5,730 years. Your dog dug a bone from your yard. It had 93% of its carbon-14 remaining. How old is the bone?
6. What is true about solutions to inconsistent systems?

### Notes/Highlights Having trouble? Report an issue.

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### Vocabulary Language: English Spanish

Extraneous Solution

An extraneous solution is a solution of a simplified version of an original equation that, when checked in the original equation, is not actually a solution.

A quadratic equation is an equation that can be written in the form $=ax^2 + bx + c = 0$, where $a$, $b$, and $c$ are real constants and $a\ne 0$.

The quadratic formula states that for any quadratic equation in the form $ax^2+bx+c=0$, $x=\frac{-b \pm \sqrt{b^2-4ac}}{2a}$.

A radical expression is an expression with numbers, operations and radicals in it.

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