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Biharmonic Map
In the mathematical field of differential geometry, a biharmonic map is a map between Riemannian or pseudo-Riemannian manifolds which satisfies a certain fourth-order partial differential equation. A biharmonic submanifold refers to an embedding or immersion into a Riemannian or pseudo-Riemannian manifold which is a biharmonic map when the domain is equipped with its induced metric. The problem of understanding biharmonic maps was posed by James Eells and Luc Lemaire in 1983. The study of harmonic maps, of which the study of biharmonic maps is an outgrowth (any harmonic map is also a biharmonic map), had been (and remains) an active field of study for the previous twenty years. A simple case of biharmonic maps is given by biharmonic functions. Definition Given Riemannian or pseudo-Riemannian manifolds and , a map from to which is differentiable at least four times is called a ''biharmonic map'' if :\Delta\Delta f+\sum_^m R^h\big(\Delta f,df(e_i),df(e_i)\big)=0; given any poin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Differential Geometry
Differential geometry is a mathematical discipline that studies the geometry of smooth shapes and smooth spaces, otherwise known as smooth manifolds. It uses the techniques of differential calculus, integral calculus, linear algebra and multilinear algebra. The field has its origins in the study of spherical geometry as far back as antiquity. It also relates to astronomy, the geodesy of the Earth, and later the study of hyperbolic geometry by Lobachevsky. The simplest examples of smooth spaces are the plane and space curves and surfaces in the three-dimensional Euclidean space, and the study of these shapes formed the basis for development of modern differential geometry during the 18th and 19th centuries. Since the late 19th century, differential geometry has grown into a field concerned more generally with geometric structures on differentiable manifolds. A geometric structure is one which defines some notion of size, distance, shape, volume, or other rigidifying structu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mean Curvature
In mathematics, the mean curvature H of a surface S is an ''extrinsic'' measure of curvature that comes from differential geometry and that locally describes the curvature of an embedded surface in some ambient space such as Euclidean space. The concept was used by Sophie Germain in her work on elasticity theory. Jean Baptiste Marie Meusnier used it in 1776, in his studies of minimal surfaces. It is important in the analysis of minimal surfaces, which have mean curvature zero, and in the analysis of physical interfaces between fluids (such as soap films) which, for example, have constant mean curvature in static flows, by the Young-Laplace equation. Definition Let p be a point on the surface S inside the three dimensional Euclidean space . Each plane through p containing the normal line to S cuts S in a (plane) curve. Fixing a choice of unit normal gives a signed curvature to that curve. As the plane is rotated by an angle \theta (always containing the normal line) that curvatur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Second Fundamental Form
In differential geometry, the second fundamental form (or shape tensor) is a quadratic form on the tangent plane of a smooth surface in the three-dimensional Euclidean space, usually denoted by \mathrm (read "two"). Together with the first fundamental form, it serves to define extrinsic invariants of the surface, its principal curvatures. More generally, such a quadratic form is defined for a smooth immersed submanifold in a Riemannian manifold. Surface in R3 Motivation The second fundamental form of a parametric surface in was introduced and studied by Gauss. First suppose that the surface is the graph of a twice continuously differentiable function, , and that the plane is tangent to the surface at the origin. Then and its partial derivatives with respect to and vanish at (0,0). Therefore, the Taylor expansion of ''f'' at (0,0) starts with quadratic terms: : z=L\frac + Mxy + N\frac + \text\,, and the second fundamental form at the origin in the coordinates is the qu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Geodesic Curvature
In Riemannian geometry, the geodesic curvature k_g of a curve \gamma measures how far the curve is from being a geodesic. For example, for 1D curves on a 2D surface embedded in 3D space, it is the curvature of the curve projected onto the surface's tangent plane. More generally, in a given manifold \bar, the geodesic curvature is just the usual curvature of \gamma (see below). However, when the curve \gamma is restricted to lie on a submanifold M of \bar (e.g. for curves on surfaces), geodesic curvature refers to the curvature of \gamma in M and it is different in general from the curvature of \gamma in the ambient manifold \bar. The (ambient) curvature k of \gamma depends on two factors: the curvature of the submanifold M in the direction of \gamma (the normal curvature k_n), which depends only on the direction of the curve, and the curvature of \gamma seen in M (the geodesic curvature k_g), which is a second order quantity. The relation between these is k = \sqrt. In particular g ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Linear Differential Equation
In mathematics, a linear differential equation is a differential equation that is defined by a linear polynomial in the unknown function and its derivatives, that is an equation of the form :a_0(x)y + a_1(x)y' + a_2(x)y'' \cdots + a_n(x)y^ = b(x) where and are arbitrary differentiable functions that do not need to be linear, and are the successive derivatives of an unknown function of the variable . Such an equation is an ordinary differential equation (ODE). A ''linear differential equation'' may also be a linear partial differential equation (PDE), if the unknown function depends on several variables, and the derivatives that appear in the equation are partial derivatives. A linear differential equation or a system of linear equations such that the associated homogeneous equations have constant coefficients may be solved by quadrature, which means that the solutions may be expressed in terms of integrals. This is also true for a linear equation of order one, with non-con ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Space Form
Space is the boundless Three-dimensional space, three-dimensional extent in which Physical body, objects and events have relative position (geometry), position and direction (geometry), direction. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually consider it, with time, to be part of a boundless four-dimensional Continuum (theory), continuum known as spacetime. The concept of space is considered to be of fundamental importance to an understanding of the physical universe. However, disagreement continues between philosophers over whether it is itself an entity, a relationship between entities, or part of a conceptual framework. Debates concerning the nature, essence and the mode of existence of space date back to antiquity; namely, to treatises like the ''Timaeus (dialogue), Timaeus'' of Plato, or Socrates in his reflections on what the Greeks called ''khôra'' (i.e. "space"), or in the ''Physics (Aristotle), P ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clifford Torus
In geometric topology, the Clifford torus is the simplest and most symmetric flat embedding of the cartesian product of two circles ''S'' and ''S'' (in the same sense that the surface of a cylinder is "flat"). It is named after William Kingdon Clifford. It resides in R4, as opposed to in R3. To see why R4 is necessary, note that if ''S'' and ''S'' each exists in its own independent embedding space R and R, the resulting product space will be R4 rather than R3. The historically popular view that the cartesian product of two circles is an R3 torus in contrast requires the highly asymmetric application of a rotation operator to the second circle, since that circle will only have one independent axis ''z'' available to it after the first circle consumes ''x'' and ''y''. Stated another way, a torus embedded in R3 is an asymmetric reduced-dimension projection of the maximally symmetric Clifford torus embedded in R4. The relationship is similar to that of projecting the edges of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Euclidean Space
Euclidean space is the fundamental space of geometry, intended to represent physical space. Originally, that is, in Euclid's Elements, Euclid's ''Elements'', it was the three-dimensional space of Euclidean geometry, but in modern mathematics there are Euclidean spaces of any positive integer dimension (mathematics), dimension, including the three-dimensional space and the ''Euclidean plane'' (dimension two). The qualifier "Euclidean" is used to distinguish Euclidean spaces from other spaces that were later considered in physics and modern mathematics. Ancient History of geometry#Greek geometry, Greek geometers introduced Euclidean space for modeling the physical space. Their work was collected by the Greek mathematics, ancient Greek mathematician Euclid in his ''Elements'', with the great innovation of ''mathematical proof, proving'' all properties of the space as theorems, by starting from a few fundamental properties, called ''postulates'', which either were considered as eviden ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stereographic Projection
In mathematics, a stereographic projection is a perspective projection of the sphere, through a specific point on the sphere (the ''pole'' or ''center of projection''), onto a plane (geometry), plane (the ''projection plane'') perpendicular to the diameter through the point. It is a smooth function, smooth, bijection, bijective function (mathematics), function from the entire sphere except the center of projection to the entire plane. It maps circle of a sphere, circles on the sphere to generalised circle, circles or lines on the plane, and is conformal map, conformal, meaning that it preserves angles at which curves meet and thus Local property, locally approximately preserves similarity (geometry), shapes. It is neither isometry, isometric (distance preserving) nor Equiareal map, equiareal (area preserving). The stereographic projection gives a way to representation (mathematics), represent a sphere by a plane. The metric tensor, metric induced metric, induced by the inverse s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Critical Point (mathematics)
Critical point is a wide term used in many branches of mathematics. When dealing with functions of a real variable, a critical point is a point in the domain of the function where the function is either not differentiable or the derivative is equal to zero. When dealing with complex variables, a critical point is, similarly, a point in the function's domain where it is either not holomorphic or the derivative is equal to zero. Likewise, for a function of several real variables, a critical point is a value in its domain where the gradient is undefined or is equal to zero. The value of the function at a critical point is a critical value. This sort of definition extends to differentiable maps between and a critical point being, in this case, a point where the rank of the Jacobian matrix is not maximal. It extends further to differentiable maps between differentiable manifolds, as the points where the rank of the Jacobian matrix decreases. In this case, critical points are al ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
