Help with Maxwell stress tensor

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SUMMARY

The discussion focuses on the Maxwell stress tensor and its application in spherical coordinates, specifically addressing the area element and its components. The original poster (OP) presents equations for the area element in spherical coordinates and questions the absence of the term \((\cos^2(θ) - \sin^2(θ))\) in a textbook equation. The response emphasizes the need to consider the \(\varphi\) dependence in the tensor components \(T_{zx}\) and \(T_{zy}\), indicating that the x and y components do not vanish and should not be treated as constants during integration.

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<< Mentor Note -- OP has been reminded to use the Homework Help Template when posting schoolwork questions >>

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my think

if ## \hat{r} = \sin(θ) \cos( φ) \hat{x} +\sin(θ) \sin( φ) \hat{y} +\cos(θ) \hat{z} ##
## da = R^2 \sin(θ) dθdφ \hat{r} = da_{x} \hat{x} + da_{x} \hat{y} + da_{z} \hat{z}##
So
##da_{x} = R^2 \sin^2(θ) \cos(φ) dθdφ ##
##da_{y} = R^2 \sin^2(θ) \sin(φ) dθdφ ##
##da_{z} = R^2 \sin(θ) \cos(θ) dθdφ ##
where
## \int_{0}^{2π} \cos(φ) \,dφ =\int_{0}^{2π} \sin(φ) \,dφ = 0 ##

##\overleftrightarrow{T} ⋅ da = 0 + 0 + T_{zz} ⋅ da_{z} ##

##T_{zz} ⋅ da_{z} = \frac{ε_{0}}{2} \left(\frac{Q}{4πε_{o}R^2}\right)^2(\cos^2(θ) - \sin^2(θ)) ⋅ R^2\sin(θ) \cos(θ) dθdφ##

But why in textbook give by
## \frac{ε_{0}}{2} \left(\frac{Q}{4πε_{o}R^2}\right)^2 ⋅ R^2\sin(θ) \cos(θ) dθdφ = \frac{ε_{0}}{2} \left(\frac{Q}{4πε_{o}R}\right)^2\sin(θ) \cos(θ) dθdφ##

where are ##(\cos^2(θ) - \sin^2(θ))## ?. ##(\cos^2(θ) - \sin^2(θ))## is missing .
I don't understand
 

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The x and y components do not vanish. There is a ##\varphi## dependence also in ##T_{zx}## and ##T_{zy}## that you need to take into account. You cannot just integrate the area element assuming that they are constant.
 
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