Differentiable unbounded function $f: (a, b)\to \mathbb R$ must have unbounded derivatives

calculusderivatives

For a function $f: (a, b) \to \mathbb{R}$ that is unbounded and differentiable, how can you show, using the Mean Value Theorem, that its derivative is also an unbounded function?

As far as I have gotten is basically just the definition of unboundedness being when the function is not bounded.

Bounded meaning that $\exists M \in \mathbb{R}: |f(x)| \leq M, \forall x \in X$, where $X$ is the set the function is defined on.

And the Mean Value Theorem being $f'(c) = \frac{f(b) – f(a)}{b-a}$ for some interval $(a,b)$.

But I am unsure how this applies to the whole function, $f(x)$, not just at the point $c$, and how this can be used to show that the derivative is unbounded.

Best Answer

Note that it is crucial the domain of the function be a bounded open interval, because if the domain is $\Bbb{R}$ then the claim is false ($f(x)=x$ is unbounded on $\Bbb{R}$ yet its derivative is constant hence trivially bounded).

One way of phrasing the argument is contrapositively, and I find that simpler. So, we suppose $f'$ is bounded on $(a,b)$, say by $B$, and we want to show $f$ itself is bounded. So, fix an $x_0\in(a,b)$ (for example $\frac{a+b}{2}$... it doesn't really matter, just pick a point and keep it fixed for the rest of the discussion), and let $x\in (a,b)$ be arbitrary. Then, \begin{align} |f(x)-f(x_0)|\leq B|x-x_0|. \end{align} (if $x=x_0$ this inequality is trivially true, if $x<x_0$ use the mean-value theorem on the interval $(x,x_0)$ while if $x_0<x$ then use the mean-value theorem on $(x_0,x)$). In particular, by the reverse triangle inequality, \begin{align} |f(x)|&\leq |f(x_0)|+B|x-x_0|\\ &\leq |f(x_0)|+B(b-a). \end{align} Since $x\in (a,b)$ is arbitrary, we have that $f$ is bounded by $M:=|f(x_0)|+B(b-a)$.

The crux of this argument is that if $f'$ is bounded, then $f$ satisfies a Lipschitz condition, and therefore is bounded on every bounded interval.