- #1
birulami
- 155
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Lagrangian sought for given conservation "law"
Reading about the Lagrangian and conservation laws, I was wondering if, given the conservation law
[tex]|\dot{x(t)}| = const[/tex]
where [itex]x[/itex] is an n-dimensional vector, we can find the Lagrangian [itex]L(t, x(t), \dot{x(t)})[/itex] that produces this conservation law via the action integral's minimum or maximum?
Note that a constant absolute velocity does not mean the particle has to go in a straight line. It only means that any acceleration is always strictly orthogonal to [itex]\dot{x}[/itex].
Reading about the Lagrangian and conservation laws, I was wondering if, given the conservation law
[tex]|\dot{x(t)}| = const[/tex]
where [itex]x[/itex] is an n-dimensional vector, we can find the Lagrangian [itex]L(t, x(t), \dot{x(t)})[/itex] that produces this conservation law via the action integral's minimum or maximum?
Note that a constant absolute velocity does not mean the particle has to go in a straight line. It only means that any acceleration is always strictly orthogonal to [itex]\dot{x}[/itex].