Plot of elliptic rational functions for x between -1 and 1 for orders 1,2,3 and 4 with discrimination factor ξ=1.1. Note that all are bounded between -1 and 1 and all have the value 1 at
x=1.
In mathematics the elliptic rational functions are a sequence of rational functions with real coefficients. Elliptic rational functions are extensively used in the design of elliptic electronic filters. (These functions are sometimes called Chebyshev rational functions, not to be confused with certain other functions of the same name).
Rational elliptic functions are identified by a positive integer order n and include a parameter ξ ≥ 1 called the selectivity factor. A rational elliptic function of degree n in x with selectivity factor ξ is generally defined as:

For many cases, in particular for orders of the form n = 2a3b where a and b are integers, the elliptic rational functions can be expressed using algebraic functions alone. Elliptic rational functions are closely related to the Chebyshev polynomials: Just as the circular trigonometric functions are special cases of the Jacobi elliptic functions, so the Chebyshev polynomials are special cases of the elliptic rational functions.
Expression as a ratio of polynomials
For even orders, the elliptic rational functions may be expressed as a ratio of two polynomials, both of order n.
(for n even)
where
are the zeroes and
are the poles, and
is a normalizing constant chosen such that
. The above form would be true for even orders as well except that for odd orders, there will be a pole at x=∞ and a zero at x=0 so that the above form must be modified to read:
(for n odd)
Properties
Plot of the absolute value of the third order elliptic rational function with ξ=1.4. Note the zero at
x=0 and the pole at infinity. Since the function is antisymmetric, it is seen there are three zeroes and three poles. Note also that between the zeroes, the function rises to a value of 1 and between the poles, the function drops to the value of the discrimination factor
Ln
Plot of the absolute value of the fourth order elliptic rational function with ξ=1.4. Since the function is symmetric, it is seen that there are four zeroes and four poles. Note again that between the zeroes, the function rises to a value of 1 and between the poles, the function drops to the value of the discrimination factor
Ln
Plot of the effect of the selectivity factor ξ. The fourth order elliptic rational function is shown with values of ξ varying from nearly unity to infinity. The black curve, corresponding to ξ=∞ is the
Chebyshev polynomial of order 4. The closer the selectivity factor is to unity, the steeper will be the slope at in the transition region between x=1 and x=ξ.
The canonical properties
for 
at 

for 
- The slope at x=1 is as large as possible
- The slope at x=1 is larger than the corresponding slope of the Chebyshev polynomial of the same order.
The only rational function satisfying the above properties is the elliptic rational function Template:Harv. The following properties are derived:
Normalization
The elliptic rational function is normalized to unity at x=1:

Nesting property
The nesting property is written:

This is a very important property:

Limiting values
The elliptic rational functions are related to the Chebyshev polynomials of the first kind
by:

Symmetry
for n even
for n odd
Equiripple
has equal ripple of
in the interval
. By the inversion relationship (see below), it follows that
has equiripple in
of
.
Inversion relationship
The following inversion relationship holds:

This implies that poles and zeroes come in pairs such that

Odd order functions will have a zero at x=0 and a corresponding pole at infinity.
Poles and Zeroes
The zeroes of the elliptic rational function of order n will be written
or
when
is implicitly known. The zeroes of the elliptic rational function will be the zeroes of the polynomial in the numerator of the function.
The following derivation of the zeroes of the elliptic rational function is analogous to that of determining the zeroes of the Chebyshev polynomials Template:Harv. Using the fact that for any z

the defining equation for the elliptic rational functions implies that

so that the zeroes are given by

Using the inversion relationship, the poles may then be calculated.
From the nesting property, if the zeroes of
and
can be algebraically expressed (i.e. without the need for calculating the Jacobi ellipse functions) then the zeroes of
can be algebraically expressed. In particular, the zeroes of elliptic rational functions of order
may be algebraically expressed Template:Harv. For example, we can find the zeroes of
as follows: Define

Then, from the nesting property and knowing that

where
we have:


These last three equations may be inverted:

To calculate the zeroes of
we set
in the third equation, calculate the two values of
, then use these values of
in the second equation to calculate four values of
and finally, use these values in the first equation to calculate the eight zeroes of
. (The
are calculated by a similar recursion.) Again, using the inversion relationship, these zeroes can be used to calculate the poles.
Particular values
We may write the first few elliptic rational functions as:

- where

- where




etc.
See Template:Harvtxt for further explicit expressions of order n=5 and
.
The corresponding discrimination factors are:




etc.
The corresponding zeroes are
where n is the order and j is the number of the zero. There will be a total of n zeroes for each order.










From the inversion relationship, the corresponding poles
may be found by
References
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