Taking reciprocals in the finite product defining the gamma function gives
Let . Since
and , where is the Euler--Mascheroni constant, passage to the limit gives the Weierstrass product for the reciprocal gamma function
The logarithmic derivative of this identity is
Since , the digamma function therefore satisfies
For real , termwise differentiation gives the trigamma function
Thus is strictly increasing on the positive real axis. At the two positive integers needed here, telescoping gives
The intermediate value theorem supplies a zero in , and strict increase makes it unique. This is the positive zero of the digamma function.
With population , the transition diagram has the two outgoing arrows
Thus this is a batch-birth linear-death process. If and for , probability enters state from by a birth and from by a death. Hence the master equation is
The Markov jump-process generator is
For , this gives . Therefore the expected value satisfies
so
For ,
Writing and using the generator identity gives
The variance consequently obeys
If , substitution of the formula for yields
All transient terms vanish, and the moments of a batch-birth linear-death process therefore give
For , the last flip must be the th head. Among the preceding flips, exactly are tails and are heads. There are choices for their positions, and every resulting sequence has probability . The negative binomial stopping argument therefore gives
so has the failures-before-the-th-success negative binomial distribution.
To put the mass function into exponential family form, set
Since ,
where
Thus the natural parameter of an exponential family is , and the Fisher-Neyman factorization theorem shows that is a sufficient statistic. This is the negative binomial exponential family.
The exponential-family derivative identities now give
and

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