Spreadsheets in Mathematics

Jeff Dozier


In this assignment, we will construct the Fibonnaci sequence using spreadsheets in Microsoft Excel. We will start with 0 and 1 along with their outputs. This is given by f(0) = 1 and f(1) = 1. In a Fibonacci sequence, the following numbers are found by adding the previous two numbers so f(2) will be 1 + 1 or 2. The general formula for this sequence is

f(n) = f(n-1) + f(n-2)

Click here to see the spreadsheet and scatter plot containing the output for the first 25 terms of this sequence.

Something interesting happens if we look at some of the ratios of these outputs. For example, we can find the ratio of each pair of terms or the ratio of every fourth term, etc.

Click here to see a spreadsheet containing these different ratios.


Now, let's explore with other cases where f(0) and f(1) are different from 1. For example, let's use f(0) = 3 and f(1) = 4 and find the sequence of numbers the same way we did with the Fibonacci sequence.

Click here to see the spreadsheet of the first 25 terms of this sequence along with some of the ratios.


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