Background

This section introduces Gamma probability distribution, defined by the probability density function shown below.  The Gamma distribution provides a family of skewed distributions that are useful in modeling a variety of random variables.

Additionally, other useful named distributions, such as the exponential distribution, are special cases of the Gamma distribution.

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NOTE: Devore uses the convention that all PDFs are defined for the entire real line, with appropriate conditional definitions used to set the PDF to zero where appropriate.  It is more convenient in the Mathematica environment to define the PDF over an interval on the real line, called the support, with the convention that the PDF is zero at all other points.

Created by Mathematica  (July 20, 2006)