Calculus – Is Calculating the Summation of Derivatives Mathematically Sound?

calculusderivativessummation

I have just discovered that if you take the following series: $$1 + x + x^2 + x^3 + x^4 + \cdot \cdot \cdot = \sum_{n = 0}^\infty x^n$$ and replace each term in the series with the derivative of them, you'll get: $$1 + 2x + 3x^2 + 4x^3 + 5x^4$$ Which I think could simplify to this: $$\sum_{n = 0}^\infty \frac {d}{dx}x^n$$ The question about this is: Is it [mathematically] sound to compute a summation of derivatives (or differentials)? I'm asking this because it looks like it is sound in this case because we are adding up all the derivatives of $x^n$ until $x = \infty$. So, is it sound to compute sums of derivatives?

Reminders about Question

I have seen a question related to this: infinite summation of derivatives of a convergent function, but it didn't get me to where I am aiming for. I have also seen Calculus Summations and Help with derivative inside a summation, but they don't answer my question.

Best Answer

This sort of thing usually comes up in the context of trying to interchange the derivative with the sum: that is, you would like to have

$$\frac{d}{dx} \sum_{n=0}^\infty f_n(x) = \sum_{n=0}^\infty f'_n(x)$$

by analogy with the case of finite summation. This interchange can sometimes fail. The most basic criterion that I have heard of is one of the "advanced calculus criteria" (so called because it is taught in undergraduate real analysis and has no famous name). It requires that $\sum_{n=0}^\infty f'_n(x)$ converges uniformly in $x$ (over the domain on which you have the equality). Milder criteria exist; for instance there is a variant based on the dominated convergence theorem from measure theory.

I'm not sure if this answers your question because I'm not sure what "sound" means in this context.