An equation , with and real coefficients, becomes after squaring. If , completing the square gives a circle. The original locus is only the part where . Checking this sign on the candidate circle prevents extraneous points introduced by squaring. This method combines the complex modulus with elementary conic geometry.
Complex modulus 2026-10-06
The complex modulus of is . It is the Euclidean norm of in the complex plane, and satisfies and the triangle inequality.
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2015 ia Paper 1 1B a Solution Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-10-06
Write . Using the complex conjugate, the squared complex modulus on the left is . Squaring the equality and dividing by , which is nonzero, givesCompleting the square identifies the candidate circle:Its centre is on the real axis and its radius is in the complex plane.
It remains to exclude extraneous points introduced by squaring. On this circle, , so the original right-hand side satisfiesThus taking the nonnegative square root recovers the original equality at every point of the circle. This is a circle from an affine complex-modulus equation, with the sign check essential to the geometric conclusion.