Di®erential Equation Notes Dan Singer Minnesota State University, Mankato
[email protected] 1 Trajectories n n A trajectory in R is a function ® :[t0; t1] ! R of the form ®(t) = (®1(t); ®2(t); : : : ; ®n(t)): The graph of the trajectory is f®(t): t 2 [t0; t1]g: Example 1.1. Let ® : [0; 2¼] ! R2 be de¯ned by ®(t) = (cos t; sin t): The graph of ® is f(x; y) 2 R2 : x2 + y2 = 1g, the unit circle. 1 0.5 -1 -0.5 0.5 1 -0.5 -1 1 Example 1.2. Let ® : [0; 2¼] ! R2 be de¯ned by ®(t) = (8 cos t; 3 sin t): 2 x2 y2 The graph of ® is f(x; y) 2 R : 82 + 32 = 1g, the ellipse with major axis of length 16 and minor axis of length 6. 3 2 1 -7.5 -5 -2.5 2.5 5 7.5 -1 -2 -3 Example 1.3. Let ® : [0; 13¼] ! R3 be de¯ned by p ®(t) = (2 cos t; 2 sin t; t): The graph of ® is a helix of radius 1. As t increases the graph becomes increasingly compressed. -1 1 -0.5 0 0.5 0.5 0 1 -0.5 -1 6 4 2 0 2 2 Direction vectors Each point ®(t) of a trajectory ® can be regarded as a vector which begins at the origin and ends at ®(t). The displacement from position ®(t) to ®(t0) is the vector ®(t + h) ¡ ®(t). The average rate of change of position from time t to time t + h is 1 (®(t + h) ¡ ®(t)): h The instantaneous rate of change of the position vector at time t is the limit 1 ®0(t) = lim (®(t + h) ¡ ®(t)): h!0 h If ®(t) = (®1(t); ®2(t); : : : ; ®n(t)); then 0 0 0 0 ® (t) = (®1(t); ®2(t); : : : ; ®n(t)): We can interpret ®0(t) as the direction a particle is heading in at time t as it is traveling along the trajectory ®.