Recent content by ozone

  1. O

    Will an infinite plane of charge flux generate flux through itself?

    I just have a quick question, and I'm guessing the answer is no but I wanted to make sure that this was sensible. In general whenever we consider flux we think of some kind of closed surface or a scenario where charge closes back on itself. If I were to cut a hole in an infinite plate of...
  2. O

    Astrophysics - Safe Choice vs Risky Choice

    Hello all, I was hoping to get some advice from people who have already completed their phd and have faced the real world situation of the post-doc pressures and job market. I am at a cross-roads now that I have been admitted to some graduate programs, and I am really struggling to decide...
  3. O

    Is there any intro topics involving topology and physics?

    I have recently been assigned a project in my undergraduate topology class. I would like to do something in physics which involves topology, but I am having trouble finding a basic topic. I understand that there are some very advanced topics in string theory and the like, but I would like to...
  4. O

    Second order geodesic equation.

    Fair enough, I agree with what you are saying. My main question then is what do we do with these constants of integration? May we just arbitrarily set them equal to one?
  5. O

    Second order geodesic equation.

    True but the equation above should only have one independent solution as best I can ascertain.. Suppose for simplicity we had a diagonal connection coefficient which is valued at 1 in some \bar{x} direction, I don't see how that is different from writing \dot{x}= x^2 (by substituting x =...
  6. O

    Second order geodesic equation.

    Sorry I should have been more clear, I believe that I have two independent solutions to the geodesic equation for a single direction, but perhaps I am misinterpreting the result. The equation is written as \ddot{x}(\tau)^a = A_{ab}(\tau) x(\tau)^b Here a,b are the two orthogonal...
  7. O

    Second order geodesic equation.

    Hello all, I have a geodesic equation from extremizing the action which is second order. I am curious as to what the significance is of having 2 independent geodesic equations is. Also I was wondering what the best way to deal with this is.
  8. O

    How difficult is it to solve this elliptic ODE.

    Hello, I am working on a research problem and I am not sure whether or not I will be able to figure this out in a suitable amount of time. I have never solved a single elliptic integral and they do seem non-trivial to gain an understanding of (most of the books I've glanced at assume a very...
  9. O

    Solving the r(λ) Null Schwarzschild Geodesic: Methods and Challenges

    Homework Statement I am looking to solve the r(λ) null Schwarzschild geodesic in terms of the affine parameter λ, but I have not seen this done anywhere and I am not sure that it is even possible to do this somewhat close to analytically. As best I know there is no use-able boundary...
  10. O

    Can a basic knowledge of perturbation theory solve this?

    I tried this substitution but I'm very certain it will not actually uncouple these ode's, unless I am missing a very interesting algebra trick
  11. O

    Can a basic knowledge of perturbation theory solve this?

    Hello all, I have boiled a very long physics problem down to the point that I need to solve the coupled equations \frac{\partial^2 x}{\partial u^2} + xf(u) + yg(u) = 0 \frac{\partial^2 y}{\partial u^2} + yf(u) - xg(u) = 0 We may assume that |f| ,|g| << 1. and that both f and g are...
  12. O

    Need help showing important tangent plane property:

    Edit: I realized v is just a constant so what we really should have is something like N = \pm b(t) . Also I forgot to mention I had a factor of |\alpha(t)|^4 so that N = \pm |\alpha(t)|^4 b(t) but I assumed that the curve is parameterized by arc-length so that I could ignore this term...
  13. O

    Need help showing important tangent plane property:

    Homework Statement Consider the tangent surface of some regular differentiable curve given as X(t,v) = \alpha(t) + v \alpha'(t) . Show that the tangent planes along X(t,constant) are equal. Homework Equations N = \frac{X_{t} \wedge X_{v}}{|X_{t} \wedge X_{v}|} The general tangent...
  14. O

    Does an explicit list of 20 independent compenents of Riemman exist?

    haha thanks for the help guys, I guess then I know which pair is redundant out of the 21 I came up with. Yes I am not looking forward to calculating this =/ I guess my Prof. must really want to punish his students.
  15. O

    Does an explicit list of 20 independent compenents of Riemman exist?

    Hello all, I have been given a problem where I am asked to calculate "all" the components of the Riemann tensor in a gross non-diagonalized metric. I know there exists at most 20 independent components of Riemann, but I want to actually compose a list of these combinations. It is easy...
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