Generally
speaking, researchers involved in dynamics study how a physical system
might develop or alter over time and study the causes of those changes.
In addition, Newton established the fundamental physical laws which
govern dynamics in physics. By studying his system of mechanics,
dynamics can be understood. In particular, dynamics is mostly related to
Newton's second law of motion. However, all three laws of motion are
taken into account because these are interrelated in any given
observation or experiment.
Linear and rotational dynamics
The
study of dynamics falls under two categories: linear and rotational.
Linear dynamics pertains to objects moving in a line and involves such
quantities as force, mass/inertia, displacement (in units of distance), velocity (distance per unit time), acceleration (distance per unit of time squared) and momentum
(mass times unit of velocity). Rotational dynamics pertains to objects
that are rotating or moving in a curved path and involves such
quantities as torque, moment of inertia/rotational inertia, angular displacement (in radians or less often, degrees), angular velocity (radians per unit time), angular acceleration (radians per unit of time squared) and angular momentum (moment of inertia times unit of angular velocity). Very often, objects exhibit linear and rotational motion.
For classical electromagnetism, Maxwell's equations
describe the kinematics. The dynamics of classical systems involving
both mechanics and electromagnetism are described by the combination of
Newton's laws, Maxwell's equations, and the Lorentz force.
Force
From Newton, force can be defined as an exertion or pressure which can cause an object to accelerate. The concept of force is used to describe an influence which causes a free body (object) to accelerate. It can be a push or a pull, which causes an object to change direction, have new velocity, or to deform temporarily or permanently. Generally speaking, force causes an object's state of motion to change.
Newton's laws
Newton described force as the ability to cause a mass to accelerate. His three laws can be summarized as follows:
First law: If there is no net force on an object, then its velocity
is constant. Either the object is at rest (if its velocity is equal to
zero), or it moves with constant speed in a single direction.
Second law: The rate of change of linear momentum P of an object is equal to the net force Fnet, i.e., dP/dt = Fnet.
Third law: When a first body exerts a force F1 on a second body, the second body simultaneously exerts a force F2 = −F1 on the first body. This means that F1 and F2 are equal in magnitude and opposite in direction.
Newton's Laws of Motion are valid only in an inertial frame of reference.
A rotating frame of reference is a special case of a non-inertial reference frame that is rotating relative to an inertial reference frame. An everyday example of a rotating reference frame is the surface of the Earth. (This article considers only frames rotating about a fixed axis. For more general rotations, see Euler angles.)
In
the inertial frame of reference (upper part of the picture), the black
ball moves in a straight line. However, the observer (red dot) who is
standing in the rotating/non-inertial frame of reference (lower part of
the picture) sees the object as following a curved path due to the
Coriolis and centrifugal forces present in this frame.
Scientists in a rotating box can measure the speed and direction of
their rotation by measuring these fictitious forces. For example, Léon Foucault was able to show the Coriolis force that results from Earth's rotation using the Foucault pendulum. If Earth were to rotate many times faster, these fictitious forces could be felt by humans, as they are when on a spinning carousel.
Relating rotating frames to stationary frames
The
following is a derivation of the formulas for accelerations as well as
fictitious forces in a rotating frame. It begins with the relation
between a particle's coordinates in a rotating frame and its coordinates
in an inertial (stationary) frame. Then, by taking time derivatives,
formulas are derived that relate the velocity of the particle as seen in
the two frames, and the acceleration relative to each frame. Using
these accelerations, the fictitious forces are identified by comparing
Newton's second law as formulated in the two different frames.
Relation between positions in the two frames
To derive these fictitious forces, it's helpful to be able to convert between the coordinates of the rotating reference frame and the coordinates of an inertial reference frame with the same origin. If the rotation is about the axis with a constant angular velocity, or , and the two reference frames coincide at time , the transformation from rotating coordinates to inertial coordinates can be written
Introduce the unit vectors
representing standard unit basis vectors in the rotating frame. The
time-derivatives of these unit vectors are found next. Suppose the
frames are aligned at t = 0 and the z-axis is the axis of rotation. Then for a counterclockwise rotation through angle Ωt:
where the (x, y) components are expressed in the stationary frame. Likewise,
Thus the time derivative of these vectors, which rotate without changing magnitude, is
where .
This result is the same as found using a vector cross product with the rotation vector pointed along the z-axis of rotation , namely,
where is either or .
Time derivatives in the two frames
Introduce the unit vectors
representing standard unit basis vectors in the rotating frame. As they
rotate they will remain normalized. If we let them rotate at the speed
of about an axis then each unit vector of the rotating coordinate system abides by the following equation:
Then if we have a vector function ,
and we want to examine its first derivative we have (using the product rule of differentiation):[2][3]
where is the rate of change of as observed in the rotating coordinate system. As a shorthand the differentiation is expressed as:
This result is also known as the Transport Theorem in analytical
dynamics and is also sometimes referred to as the Basic Kinematic
Equation.
Relation between velocities in the two frames
A velocity of an object is the time-derivative of the object's position, or
The time derivative of a position
in a rotating reference frame has two components, one from the explicit
time dependence due to motion of the particle itself, and another from
the frame's own rotation. Applying the result of the previous
subsection to the displacement , the velocities in the two reference frames are related by the equation
where subscript i means the inertial frame of reference, and r means the rotating frame of reference.
Relation between accelerations in the two frames
Acceleration is the second time derivative of position, or the first time derivative of velocity
where subscript i means the inertial frame of reference.
Carrying out the differentiations and re-arranging some terms yields the acceleration relative to the rotating reference frame,
When
the expression for acceleration is multiplied by the mass of the
particle, the three extra terms on the right-hand side result in fictitious forces in the rotating reference frame, that is, apparent forces that result from being in a non-inertial reference frame, rather than from any physical interaction between bodies.
where is the mass of the object being acted upon by these fictitious forces. Notice that all three forces vanish when the frame is not rotating, that is, when
For completeness, the inertial acceleration due to impressed external forces
can be determined from the total physical force in the inertial
(non-rotating) frame (for example, force from physical interactions such
as electromagnetic forces) using Newton's second law in the inertial frame:
Newton's law in the rotating frame then becomes
In other words, to handle the laws of motion in a rotating reference frame:
Treat the fictitious forces like real forces, and pretend you are in an inertial frame.
— Louis N. Hand, Janet D. Finch Analytical Mechanics, p. 267
Obviously, a rotating frame of
reference is a case of a non-inertial frame. Thus the particle in
addition to the real force is acted upon by a fictitious force...The
particle will move according to Newton's second law of motion if the
total force acting on it is taken as the sum of the real and fictitious
forces.
— HS Hans & SP Pui: Mechanics; p. 341
This equation has exactly the form of Newton's second law, except that in addition to F,
the sum of all forces identified in the inertial frame, there is an
extra term on the right...This means we can continue to use Newton's
second law in the noninertial frame provided we agree that in the noninertial frame we must add an extra force-like term, often called the inertial force.
— John R. Taylor: Classical Mechanics; p. 328
Centrifugal force
In classical mechanics, centrifugal force is an outward force associated with rotation. Centrifugal force is one of several so-called pseudo-forces (also known as inertial forces), so named because, unlike real forces,
they do not originate in interactions with other bodies situated in the
environment of the particle upon which they act. Instead, centrifugal
force originates in the rotation of the frame of reference within which
observations are made.
Coriolis effect
Figure
1: In the inertial frame of reference (upper part of the picture), the
black object moves in a straight line. However, the observer (red dot)
who is standing in the rotating frame of reference (lower part of the
picture) sees the object as following a curved path.
Perhaps the most commonly encountered rotating reference frame is the Earth. Moving objects on the surface of the Earth experience a Coriolis force, and appear to veer to the right in the northern hemisphere, and to the left in the southern.
Movements of air in the atmosphere and water in the ocean are notable
examples of this behavior: rather than flowing directly from areas of
high pressure to low pressure, as they would on a non-rotating planet,
winds and currents tend to flow to the right of this direction north of
the equator, and to the left of this direction south of the equator. This effect is responsible for the rotation of large cyclones (see Coriolis effects in meteorology).
Euler force
In classical mechanics, the Euler acceleration (named for Leonhard Euler), also known as azimuthal acceleration or transverse acceleration is an acceleration that appears when a non-uniformly rotating reference frame is used for analysis of motion and there is variation in the angular velocity of the reference frame's axis. This article is restricted to a frame of reference that rotates about a fixed axis.
The Euler force is a fictitious force on a body that is related to the Euler acceleration by F = ma, where a is the Euler acceleration and m is the mass of the body.