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In physical theories, a test particle, or test charge, is an idealized model of an object whose physical properties (usually
mass Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different ele ...
,
charge Charge or charged may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Films * '' Charge, Zero Emissions/Maximum Speed'', a 2011 documentary Music * ''Charge'' (David Ford album) * ''Charge'' (Machel Montano album) * ''Charge!!'', an album by The Aqu ...
, or
size Size in general is the magnitude or dimensions of a thing. More specifically, ''geometrical size'' (or ''spatial size'') can refer to linear dimensions ( length, width, height, diameter, perimeter), area, or volume. Size can also be me ...
) are assumed to be negligible except for the property being studied, which is considered to be insufficient to alter the behavior of the rest of the system. The concept of a test particle often simplifies problems, and can provide a good approximation for physical phenomena. In addition to its uses in the simplification of the dynamics of a system in particular limits, it is also used as a diagnostic in
computer simulations Computer simulation is the process of mathematical modelling, performed on a computer, which is designed to predict the behaviour of, or the outcome of, a real-world or physical system. The reliability of some mathematical models can be dete ...
of physical processes.


Classical gravity

The easiest case for the application of a test particle arises in
Newtonian gravity Newton's law of universal gravitation is usually stated as that every particle attracts every other particle in the universe with a force that is proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distanc ...
. The general expression for the gravitational force between any two point masses m_1 and m_2 is: :F = -G \frac, where \mathbf_1 and \mathbf_2 represent the position of each particle in space. In the general solution for this equation, both masses rotate around their
center of mass In physics, the center of mass of a distribution of mass in space (sometimes referred to as the balance point) is the unique point where the weighted relative position of the distributed mass sums to zero. This is the point to which a force may ...
R, in this specific case: :\mathbf = \frac. In the case where one of the masses is much larger than the other (m_1\gg m_2), one can assume that the smaller mass moves as a test particle in a
gravitational field In physics, a gravitational field is a model used to explain the influences that a massive body extends into the space around itself, producing a force on another massive body. Thus, a gravitational field is used to explain gravitational pheno ...
generated by the larger mass, which does not accelerate. We can define the gravitational field as :\mathbf(r) = -\frac\hat, with r as the distance between the massive object and the test particle, and \hat is the unit vector in the direction going from the massive object to the test mass.
Newton's second law of motion Newton's laws of motion are three basic Scientific law, laws of classical mechanics that describe the relationship between the motion of an object and the forces acting on it. These laws can be paraphrased as follows: # A body remains at re ...
of the smaller mass reduces to :\mathbf(r) = \frac\hat = \mathbf(r), and thus only contains one variable, for which the solution can be calculated more easily. This approach gives very good approximations for many practical problems, e.g. the orbits of
satellites A satellite or artificial satellite is an object intentionally placed into orbit in outer space. Except for passive satellites, most satellites have an electricity generation system for equipment on board, such as solar panels or radioisotop ...
, whose mass is relatively small compared to that of the
Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's sur ...
.


Electrostatics

In simulations with
electric field An electric field (sometimes E-field) is the physical field that surrounds electrically charged particles and exerts force on all other charged particles in the field, either attracting or repelling them. It also refers to the physical field ...
s the most important characteristics of a test particle is its
electric charge Electric charge is the physical property of matter that causes charged matter to experience a force when placed in an electromagnetic field. Electric charge can be ''positive'' or ''negative'' (commonly carried by protons and electrons res ...
and its
mass Mass is an intrinsic property of a body. It was traditionally believed to be related to the quantity of matter in a physical body, until the discovery of the atom and particle physics. It was found that different atoms and different ele ...
. In this situation it is often referred to as a test charge. Similar to the case of classical gravitation, the electric field created by a point charge ''q'' is defined by : \textbf = k\frac \hat , where ''k'' is the
Coulomb constant The Coulomb constant, the electric force constant, or the electrostatic constant (denoted , or ) is a proportionality constant in electrostatics equations. In SI base units it is equal to .Derived from ''k''e = 1/(4''πε''0) – It was named ...
. Multiplying this field by a test charge q_\textrm gives an electric force (
Coulomb's law Coulomb's inverse-square law, or simply Coulomb's law, is an experimental law of physics that quantifies the amount of force between two stationary, electrically charged particles. The electric force between charged bodies at rest is convention ...
) exerted by the field on a test charge. Note that both the force and the electric field are vector quantities, so a positive test charge will experience a force in the direction of the electric field.


General relativity

In metric theories of gravitation, particularly
general relativity General relativity, also known as the general theory of relativity and Einstein's theory of gravity, is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1915 and is the current description of gravitation in modern physics ...
, a test particle is an idealized model of a small object whose mass is so small that it does not appreciably disturb the ambient
gravitational field In physics, a gravitational field is a model used to explain the influences that a massive body extends into the space around itself, producing a force on another massive body. Thus, a gravitational field is used to explain gravitational pheno ...
. According to the
Einstein field equations In the general theory of relativity, the Einstein field equations (EFE; also known as Einstein's equations) relate the geometry of spacetime to the distribution of matter within it. The equations were published by Einstein in 1915 in the form ...
, the gravitational field is locally coupled not only to the distribution of non-gravitational mass-energy, but also to the distribution of
momentum In Newtonian mechanics, momentum (more specifically linear momentum or translational momentum) is the product of the mass and velocity of an object. It is a vector quantity, possessing a magnitude and a direction. If is an object's mass ...
and
stress Stress may refer to: Science and medicine * Stress (biology), an organism's response to a stressor such as an environmental condition * Stress (linguistics), relative emphasis or prominence given to a syllable in a word, or to a word in a phrase ...
(e.g. pressure, viscous stresses in a perfect fluid). In the case of test particles in a
vacuum solution In general relativity, a vacuum solution is a Lorentzian manifold whose Einstein tensor vanishes identically. According to the Einstein field equation, this means that the stress–energy tensor also vanishes identically, so that no matter or no ...
or
electrovacuum solution In general relativity, an electrovacuum solution (electrovacuum) is an exact solution of the Einstein field equation in which the only nongravitational mass–energy present is the field energy of an electromagnetic field, which must satisfy the (c ...
, this turns out to imply that in addition to the tidal acceleration experienced by small clouds of test particles (spinning or not), ''spinning'' test particles may experience additional
acceleration In mechanics, acceleration is the rate of change of the velocity of an object with respect to time. Accelerations are vector quantities (in that they have magnitude and direction). The orientation of an object's acceleration is given by ...
s due to spin-spin forces.


See also

*
Point mass A point particle (ideal particle or point-like particle, often spelled pointlike particle) is an idealization of particles heavily used in physics. Its defining feature is that it lacks spatial extension; being dimensionless, it does not take up ...
*
Point charge A point particle (ideal particle or point-like particle, often spelled pointlike particle) is an idealization of particles heavily used in physics. Its defining feature is that it lacks spatial extension; being dimensionless, it does not take u ...


References

{{Reflist Mathematical methods in general relativity