imagine the top half of a circle. the origin lies along the bottom of the semicircle, and in the middle. y-axis up, and x-axis to the right and left. i think theta can only go from 0 to 180 degrees since it is a semi circle. Y = d(theta) R squared
R = radius, integrate from 0 to R
You haven't stated a problem here!
What do you want to integrate from 0 to R? What function are you integrating?
If you just want the area, look at the problem you gave:
in a rectangles case, dA = dX dY
if i have the rectangles width and it is 4 m, then dA = 4dY
(And arildno did not say he had never seen that before, he was trying to get you to think about why you think that was true.)
Suppose your semi-circles radius is R. Then dA= r dr dθ. In a sense, dr here, as well as r, is r: along each radius we go from r= 0 to R so the "change in r", dr, is R.
Okay, then r dr dθ becomes dA= R
2 dθ, just like your dX dY became 4dy, the area of the semi-circle is
\int_{\theta=0}^{\pi} R^2 d\theta= \pi R^2, exactly the right answer.
(θ does
not go from 0 to 180! As I am sure you learned in when you were learning the derivatives of sine and cosine, in calculus, all angles are in radians.)
(Oh, and by the way, why was this posted under "differential equations". Was this part of a differential equations problem?)