Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-year-2-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2005/paper-1/1/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the year 2 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge 2005 Paper 1 1 Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-10-18 Updated 2026-10-20
For , the chain rule gives . Differentiating the radial factor gives , so in Cartesian coordinatesThe origin is excluded because the scalar field is singular there.
The Stokes theorem states for a sufficiently smooth vector field and oriented surface with piecewise smooth boundary. The boundary orientation follows the right-hand rule relative to .
For the convective acceleration identity, use the Levi-Civita symbol contraction . It givesRearranging proves the required vector identity.
For orthogonal coordinates, define the scale factors of orthogonal coordinates and tangent unit vectors . They form an orthonormal basis, and . Equating with identifies each component. Thus the gradient in orthogonal coordinates isThis holds on a regular coordinate chart where all scale factors are positive.
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