How Do I Accurately Determine The Big O Notation Of A Recursive Algorithm That Has Overlapping Subproblems, Such As The Fibonacci Sequence, When The Recursive Calls Are Not Simply A Straightforward Linear Or Exponential Relationship, But Rather Involve A Combination Of Different Operations That Affect The Time Complexity In Distinct Ways?
To determine the big O notation for a recursive algorithm with overlapping subproblems, such as the Fibonacci sequence, follow these steps:
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Identify the Recurrence Relation: Express the number of operations in terms of smaller subproblems. For Fibonacci, this is .
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Solve the Recurrence Relation: Use methods like the characteristic equation. For Fibonacci, solving gives roots related to the golden ratio .
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Analyze the Growth Rate: The solution to the recurrence shows that grows exponentially with base .
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Express in Big O Notation: Since is exponential, and , the time complexity can be expressed as for simplicity, even though the exact growth is .
Answer: The time complexity of the recursive Fibonacci algorithm is .
\boxed{O(2^n)}