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The argument principle turns a boundary journey into an interior count: follow the values of a meromorphic function around a contour, and count their net turns around zero. Every enclosed zero of a function contributes its multiplicity of a zero; every enclosed pole subtracts its order. There is no need to find each zero of a function separately.

Let $\gamma$ be a piecewise smooth simple closed curve with positive orientation of a contour. Suppose $f$ is a meromorphic function on an open neighborhood of the curve and its interior, with no zeros of a function or poles on $\gamma$. ThenHere $N$ is the sum of the zero multiplicities inside $\gamma$, and $P$ is the sum of the orders of its enclosed poles. The image contour $f\circ \gamma$ may cross itself or revisit a point. Its signed winding number, rather than the number of visually bounded regions, is the quantity that counts.^[ref]

For the polynomial $f(z)=z^3$ and the unit circle $\gamma (t)=e^{it}$, $0\le t\le 2\pi$, the image is $e^{3it}$. It goes around zero three times although its drawn outline is just one circle. The interior contains one distinct zero of a function, at zero, with multiplicity of a zero three: the count is three. Reversing the orientation of a contour reverses the winding number and the sign of the contour integral.

An argument must be followed continuously along the journey. Subtracting the principal arguments at the endpoints loses whole turns: a closed image contour has the same endpoint value even when its winding number is nonzero. Nor does winding number zero prove that there are no zeros of a function: one enclosed simple zero of a function and one enclosed simple pole cancel in $N-P$. Known poles must be added back to recover $N$.

The mechanism is short. Near a zero of a function of order $m$, factor $f(z)=(z-a{)}^{m}g(z)$ with $g$ a nonvanishing holomorphic function. Its logarithmic derivative is $f^{\prime }/f=m/(z-a)+g^{\prime }/g$, so its residue is $m$. A pole of order $m$ gives residue $-m$. The residue theorem adds those contributions. Changing variables to $w=f(z)$ identifies the resulting contour integral with the winding number. This is a local algebraic count joined to a global geometric count.^[ref]

The usefulness goes beyond explicit polynomials. Rouché's theorem keeps a count unchanged when a boundary perturbation cannot push the image contour through zero. The Nyquist stability criterion applies the same counting idea to poles governing a system under feedback control.^[ref]

The orientation of a contour specifies the direction in which its parametrization is traversed. Reversing that direction negates its contour integral. For a simple closed curve in the complex plane, positive orientation of a contour is the direction keeping its bounded interior on the left.

One standard form of the Cauchy integral formula is this: if $f$ is holomorphic on an open set containing a contour that is a simple closed curve $\Gamma$ and its interior, and $\Gamma$ has positive orientation of a contour, then for every point $w$ inside it,The hypothesis includes the contour itself; singularities on the contour are excluded. In particular, the formula applies on a circle whose closed disk is contained in the domain of holomorphy.

Choose $0<\rho <r$ and traverse the circle $|z|=\rho$ counterclockwise, so it has positive orientation of a contour. The Cauchy coefficient formula gives, for every nonnegative integer $n$,The smaller radius matters: the holomorphic function is only known on $|z|<r$, so its values on $|z|=r$ need not exist. To see directly why this contour integral selects $c_n$, the power series converges uniformly on $|z|=\rho$, allowing uniform convergence and contour integration to justify integrating term by term. The contour integral of $z^{k-n-1}$ is zero for $k\ne n$ and $2\pi i$ for $k=n$. Thus all other terms disappear.

Put $D(z)={\sinh }^{2}z+{\cosh }^{2}a$ and $S=\sinh (2a)>0$. Traverse the rectangle $-R\to R\to R+\pi i\to -R+\pi i\to -R$ with positive orientation of a contour, taking $R>a$. Part (i) shows that the only enclosed poles of $f(z)=z/D(z)$ areThey are simple poles becauseThe residue formula for a quotient at a simple denominator zero givesTheir imaginary terms cancel and their residues sum to $-2a/S$. Thus Cauchy's residue theorem gives

The choice of numerator $z$ makes the horizontal sides useful. The hyperbolic sine satisfies $\sinh (z+\pi i)=-\sinh z$, so $D(x+\pi i)=D(x)$. Consequently the lower and upper contour integrals, with their actual orientations, add toIt remains to justify discarding both vertical sides. On either side $z=\pm R+iy$, $0\le y\le \pi$, the reverse triangle inequality and part (b)(ii) implyThis lower bound is positive for sufficiently large $R$. Also $|z|\le R+\pi$ and each vertical side has length $\pi$. The estimation lemma bounds the absolute value of the sum $V_R$ of the vertical contributions byThe real improper integral converges absolutely, since its integrand is continuous on the real axis and decays like $4e^{-2|x|}$ at infinity. Combining all four sides and taking $R\to \infty$ givesThereforeAn independent real-variable check uses the hyperbolic tangent substitution $u=\tanh x$: the integral becomes ${\int }_{-1}^{1}du/({\cosh }^{2}a-u^2{\sinh }^{2}a)$. Its antiderivative uses the inverse hyperbolic tangent, giving $2\mathrm{arctanh}(\tanh a)/(\sinh a\cosh a)=4a/\sinh (2a)$. As $a\downarrow 0$, this tends to $2$, agreeing with ${\int }_{-\infty }^{\infty }{\mathrm{sech}}^{2}xdx=2$ and checking the factor of two.

For $a\ne b$, integratealong the contour consisting of $[-R,R]$ and the upper semicircle, with positive orientation of a contour and $R>\max \{a,b\}$. Its enclosed simple poles are $ia$ and $ib$, with residuesOn the upper semicircle, $|e^{iz}|=e^{-\mathrm{Im}z}\le 1$. The reverse triangle inequality gives $|z^2+a^2|\ge R^2-a^2$ and $|z^2+b^2|\ge R^2-b^2$, so the estimation lemma givesThe integral along the real axis is absolutely convergent: the denominator stays nonzero on bounded real intervals, and the integrand is $O(x^{-4})$ at infinity. The residue theorem therefore givesTake real parts. The real integrand is an even function, so

To include $a=b$, fix $a>0$ and let $b\to a$. For $a/2\le b\le 3a/2$, the absolute value of the integrand is bounded byan integrable function on $[0,\infty )$. The dominated convergence theorem justifies passing the limit under the integral. If $h(t)=e^{-t}/t$, then $h^{\prime }(a)=-e^{-a}(a+1)/a^2$, andHence