An efficient higher order family of root finders

Abstract

A one parameter family of iterative methods for the simultaneous approximation of simple complex zeros of a polynomial, based on a cubically convergent Hansen-Patrick's family, is studied. We show that the convergence of the basic family of the fourth order can be increased to five and six using Newton's and Halley's corrections, respectively. Since these corrections use the already calculated values, the computational efficiency of the accelerated methods is significantly increased. Further acceleration is achieved by applying the Gauss-Seidel approach (single-step mode). One of the most important problems in solving nonlinear equations, the construction of initial conditions which provide both the guaranteed and fast convergence, is considered for the proposed accelerated family. These conditions are computationally verifiable; they depend only on the polynomial coefficients, its degree and initial approximations, which is of practical importance. Some modifications of the considered family, providing the computation of multiple zeros of polynomials and simple zeros of a wide class of analytic functions, are also studied. Numerical examples demonstrate the convergence properties of the presented family of root-finding methods.