Put and let be the center of mass. Applying Newton's second law separately to the two point masses gives
Thus the center of mass has constant velocity, . For the relative position , subtraction gives
Here is the reduced mass; it converts the relative motion into a one-body equation of motion.
For the given linear force, the relative position obeys simple harmonic motion, , where . The initial rest condition gives
For , collision first occurs when the relative position vanishes, namely when . Therefore
The separation cancels because the frequency of this simple harmonic motion is independent of its amplitude.
A kinematic redshift is the relativistic Doppler effect arising from relative motion of emitter and receiver. In a local inertial frame, recession decreases the received frequency and approach increases it. A cosmological redshift instead compares photons emitted and received by comoving observers at different cosmic times: expansion of the scale factor stretches their wavelengths. It exists even when both observers have zero peculiar velocity. Both are frequency ratios measured by observers, but a large cosmological redshift should not be inserted into a flat-spacetime radial-speed formula to define the galaxy's unique recession speed.
Let be the photon frequency in the local comoving frame just after emission. The kinematic redshift gives , and propagation in the FRW metric gives . Multiplication gives
Equivalently, . Both redshifts being small is what permits their approximate addition. Here the observer's own peculiar velocity is assumed already corrected to the Hubble flow frame.
For Planck law expressed per unit frequency, put . At fixed temperature, the frequency dependence is . Differentiation gives
The positive interior maximum therefore satisfies , with independent of temperature. The zero solution of the rearranged equation is a boundary, not the interior maximum. Hence the frequency form of Wien's displacement law is
This frequency peak is not divided by the peak wavelength of : the two spectral densities differ by the frequency-to-wavelength Jacobian.
Motion toward incoming cosmic microwave background radiation produces a blueshift. The photon occupation function of a blackbody depends on , so the same Doppler factor multiplies both frequency and effective temperature. Looking forward along the Sun's peculiar velocity, one obtains
Taking the mean cosmic microwave background temperature as about gives
The numerical total inherits the rounded mean temperature; the robust estimate is the positive millikelvin dipole increment.
Floquet theory suggests a sequence of instability tongues near
At these limiting frequencies the unperturbed Floquet multipliers coincide. Each multiplication by changes a Fourier frequency by one, so forcing interactions are needed to couple and . This explains both the sequence of parametric resonances and the successive powers of in their widths.
There is no implication that the exact half-integers themselves lie in every finite- growing interval. The tongue centers generally shift by , which exceeds the width when . It is the narrow intervals near the shifted centers that contain exponentially growing solutions. Frequencies staying a fixed distance from every half-integer are stable for sufficiently small .
Away from the first parametric resonance, one forcing interaction changes a harmonic frequency by one and produces no resonant coupling of the two conjugate oscillations. Two interactions can couple frequency to frequency , so the next parametric resonance is near and its effect first appears at order . This gives and the appropriate slow time .
Write and . The first correction satisfies , whose bounded particular solution is
At second order,
The resonant part of is . Applying the solvability condition in the method of multiple scales gives
The squared slow eigenvalue is
The second instability tongue of a weak Mathieu oscillator therefore has the leading interval
Here the two little- terms describe the respective exact edge locations; the strict inequality in is the leading interior criterion. In particular is unstable, with physical growth rate . The general leading solution for bounded again has , where the matrix exponential of the displayed two-by-two amplitude system evolves arbitrary . Adding identifies the first nonresonant harmonic correction. The leading expression alone has error on .
For comparison, at fixed , write . The first forced harmonics have coefficients and . Their return to the original harmonic at the next order gives
It is a phase correction, not amplitude growth. Consequently, away from the first two resonance neighborhoods, a general leading solution valid for bounded is
Narrower higher-order instability intervals are invisible on this time scale. The detuned resonant calculation above is needed near because both the phase shift and the conjugate-mode coupling then matter.
Set and use the method of multiple scales:
Since , the first correction satisfies
The resonant cosine and sine coefficients must vanish to avoid secular terms. Using the product-to-sum formulas gives
The remaining forcing has frequency and permits the bounded particular correction . The two slow amplitudes carry the two arbitrary constants of the original equation.
For an explicit general leading solution, put
The matrix exponential gives
The error is uniform on bounded intervals of , for bounded initial data. When is imaginary this expression uses ordinary sine and cosine; at its continuous limit is .
The primary instability tongue of a weak Mathieu oscillator has a positive slow eigenvalue precisely when
These are the leading edges, rather than an exact finite- interval. At the leading endpoints the amplitude matrix is a nilpotent matrix, so the leading solution can grow linearly in and does not decide the exact exponential instability. For completeness, set . The periodic or antiperiodic edge calculation uses a pure cosine when and a pure sine when , with the third-harmonic correction just found. The next resonant coefficient is , so
Thus the exact growing interval is between these shifted edges. In particular, for positive small the fixed leading value lies just inside it, whereas lies just outside. Interior detunings bounded away from the edges are already resolved by the leading method of multiple scales.
Place the four fixed charges at with , and write the moving particle's position as . Introduce its mass , which is needed for an oscillation frequency but is not named in the question. Let . By Coulomb's law and superposition, the moving particle's potential energy is
The electrostatic potential itself is . Put and . Near the centre, a Taylor expansion gives
On summing over the four corners, linear terms cancel. To quadratic order, and , since . Reflection symmetry removes all odd-degree terms. Hence
where
Thus the centre has zero planar force and a positive-definite planar Hessian matrix . It is a strict local minimum of the constrained potential energy, so it is a stable equilibrium. More explicitly, conservation of the total energy confines sufficiently small-energy motions within a small neighbourhood of this isolated local minimum.
Keeping only the quadratic potential, the two coordinates obey independent small oscillations:
Both planar modes have the same angular frequency, and the ordinary frequency is
The planar constraint is essential to this constrained electrostatic equilibrium. Along the perpendicular axis, , so the same stationary point is unstable to unconstrained normal displacements. That also checks the cancellation of the three-dimensional Hessian trace required by Laplace's equation away from charges; it does not contradict the positive-definite restriction to the given plane.
Apply the method of multiple scales with independent fast time and slow time , and write . The chain rule gives . At leading order,
At first order,
A forcing component at the natural frequency produces a secular term in . Thus the solvability condition in the method of multiple scales is orthogonality to both and . Define the fast-phase average, holding fixed, by
Since and , the amplitude-phase equations are
They are leading averaged equations, not exact equations for a purely sinusoidal solution of a general nonlinear oscillator.
For the cubic conservative force, , odd symmetry gives , while . Hence
If and , leading initial matching gives
and therefore
on bounded slow time intervals for fixed bounded initial data. The positive frequency shift agrees with the increased restoring force of . The zero initial state is the exact zero solution, with irrelevant phase. If a first waveform correction is desired, the remaining first-order forcing is , so plus a homogeneous correction chosen to match the initial data at the next order. This exhibits explicitly why the leading harmonic ansatz is approximate.
Substitute into the mixed-derivative equation. Its left side is , so for the dispersion relation, phase velocity and group velocity are
The graph of a function for each velocity is symmetric about , singular at zero, and approaches the horizontal axis as grows. Energy packets travel right while their crests travel left.
Figure 1.
Opposite phase and group velocities for omega=-alpha/k, shown with alpha=1
. Details.
At a distant fixed observer , stationary components obey , so . As time increases their wavelength decreases and their frequency magnitude decreases; the crests pass toward decreasing .
For the given initial spectrum the solution is
The value of a regular spectrum at the single point is irrelevant to this integral; a nonzero spatially constant mode is incompatible with the PDE. For asymptotic calculation assume the usual smooth localized spectrum, with sufficient integrability for the following stationary-phase steps.
At , , the phase has stationary points , . Their values are and their second derivatives are . Expanding quadratically and using the oscillatory Gaussian integral gives the stationary phase leading term
For real data this is twice the real part of the positive-frequency term. If a stationary coefficient vanishes, the formula instead asserts that its contribution has smaller order. At , the phase derivative is , so there is no real stationary point and no corresponding wave packet. For smooth compactly supported spectra away from zero, repeated integration by parts gives decay faster than any power of . More general spectra require endpoint/tail control; absence of stationary points alone does not justify that stronger rate for arbitrary .
The bounded classical solution is the heat-kernel convolution
The two-dimensional heat kernel has integral one. Boundedness of permits differentiation under the integral for , proving and . Its approximate identity property gives , locally uniformly since is continuous. This bounded solution satisfies the required Gaussian-growth bound.
For heat-equation uniqueness under Gaussian growth, let be the difference of two solutions, so and on a finite time interval. Choose and a slab . The positive comparison solution
satisfies . For any , its faster spatial growth makes on a sufficiently large lateral cylinder boundary. At the initial boundary, . The heat equation maximum principle applied to proves the same inequality inside. First allow the cylinder radius to increase, then let . Repeating these slabs proves uniqueness on every finite interval with the stated uniform growth bound. No spatial integrability of is required.
At time , this is Gaussian filtering with covariance , hence per coordinate. With the angular-frequency Fourier transform convention , the Gaussian filtering Fourier multiplier is
For merely bounded , this identity is understood through tempered distributions. The multiplier leaves the zero frequency unchanged and attenuates large frequencies exponentially: it suppresses rapid noise fluctuations but blurs image edges. In cycles-per-length frequency , the multiplier is .
For the printed Perona-Malik equation, retain the supplied conductance , which includes an extra factor . In one dimension write and . Then , with
The forward-backward threshold for gradient-weighted exponential diffusion is therefore
At and the coefficient vanishes, giving degenerate diffusion. Increasing increases the forward-diffusion range. Small nonzero slopes smooth, while large slopes formally sharpen; a negative coefficient produces short-wave growth and ill-posedness, so this is a dynamics explanation, not a general existence theorem for arbitrary data. Replacing the printed conductance by would give threshold , but that is a different equation.
The four-neighbour mean expansion follows by Taylor expansion: opposing first and third derivatives cancel, so
If for every sufficiently small , division by and passage to the limit give . This is a pointwise conclusion; it does not assert harmonicity in a whole neighbourhood.
For the area median over the disk, the disk-median curvature expansion, at a point where , is
Consequently the analogous median fixed-point condition yields
This is the vanishing of the level-line curvature at : to second order the level line is straight there. It need not be a straight segment. For example has zero disk median at the origin for every radius, by odd symmetry, but its zero level line is the cubic . Vanishing curvature on an entire connected regular level arc would force that arc to be straight. The factor is for the disk's uniform area measure; a circle-boundary median has a different scale factor, while producing the same zero-curvature equation.
Assume and . For , use the method of multiple scales with and complex amplitudes
At first order the forcing equations are
The product has frequencies . Its coefficient is , while it has no coefficient. Removing the secular terms gives
The leading initial conditions give and . Put , . The primary parametric resonance of a two-to-one oscillator pair is governed by
For , choose . Solving with yields
If , let ; replace by and by . On the boundary , take the continuous limit:
Thus exponential growth occurs when and , on the scale . Equality is a marginal case that can produce linear slow growth: for the displayed initial phase excites it, whereas for it does not. If , stays identically zero and the other oscillator is exactly uncoupled. The leading amplitude is constant; its backreaction is a higher-order effect on this time scale.
These are leading approximations for bounded slow time , hence , while the amplitudes stay . First-order corrections can enforce the initial velocities exactly; the leading formula alone has an initial-velocity mismatch. In the unstable case the expansion must not be extrapolated through arbitrarily large amplification, where weak coupling and omitted terms cease to be uniform.
For , both leading oscillations have frequencies , so their quadratic product contains only frequencies . There is no first-order resonant coupling: the solvability condition in the method of multiple scales gives and , a frequency shift without first-order amplitude growth. The constant and second-harmonic corrections can feed back into the fundamental at second order. Consequently the first possible growth scale from this second-order resonance from quadratic oscillator coupling is
This identifies the possible slow scale, not a guaranteed instability for every parameter or initial state. In particular, the first-order frequency shift may detune the second-order resonance unless appropriately tuned; a second-order amplitude analysis would decide actual growth.
In the local short-wavelength approximation, derivatives of the slowly varying coefficients are smaller than derivatives of the phase. For the perturbation , replace by and by in the torsional Alfvén wave equation. Cancel the common nonzero amplitude and to obtain
Thus the local dispersion relation is an Alfvén wave relation with Alfvén velocity . The approximation requires wavelength small compared with the background variation scales. A wave vector exactly perpendicular to gives zero leading frequency, so cannot simultaneously obey the assumed large-frequency limit.
The linearized azimuthal Euler momentum equation is
For the time dependence and , it gives
This expresses conservation of the displaced element's specific angular momentum. It applies directly to nonzero-frequency modes, with the zero-frequency limit taken in the displacement formulation.
The radial advective acceleration supplies , while the pressure force perturbation is . Eliminate and retain the vertical equation. Under the Cowling approximation, , so
The continuity equation gives . The Lagrangian adiabatic relation , with , gives
Here is the radial epicyclic frequency. These formulas define the axisymmetric adiabatic displacement operator.
Let , and . Since , the pressure and mass density perturbations are and . Integrating the pressure-gradient term by parts in the mass density-weighted inner product gives
The boundary term vanishes for regular admissible displacements because vanish there and . Completing the pressure square gives
where
This effective-potential stratification coefficient is real. All coefficients of the bilinear form are real, so : the operator is symmetric on the stated boundary domain, giving the usual self-adjoint realization of the stellar normal-mode problem.
Set and use . The Cowling energy principle for a rotating barotropic star is
The Rayleigh quotient tests stability. If for every admissible displacement, no mode has , so there is no exponentially growing mode. If an admissible trial displacement has , the Rayleigh-Ritz variational principle puts negative spectrum below zero; in the usual discrete stellar mode problem this gives a mode with , . Equality allows neutral modes, rather than establishing strictly positive frequencies. A locally negative coefficient alone is not a complete instability proof: a trial function must also control the pressure and other positive terms.
The dimensional linear friction coefficient is . Put and . In overdamped particle dynamics the laboratory velocity is , whereas the trap-frame velocity is . The particle enters the optical tweezers at and leaves at when the trap overtakes it. Write for this support width. The printed subtraction in the later definition of the width is a sign error: the distance between these endpoints is their sum. We use in the circular calculation.
For a bounded continuous force, the strict condition
ensures finite passage through a translating optical trap: the trap-frame coordinate decreases throughout the interaction. If is encountered from the right, the deterministic trajectory cannot pass this stationary trap-frame point for a locally Lipschitz force; it approaches or stays at a locked state. At a smooth maximum the critical passage time diverges. More generally the passage criterion is on the traversed interval together with a finite integral below. Separating the trap-frame equation gives
These formulas account for both portions of the optical tweezers, including motion against the trap direction.
The forward-displacement result uses the ordinary localized potential energy interpretation of an optical trap: and has the same value outside both ends, hence . Compact support of the force alone does not ensure that condition. Under the equal-endpoint condition,
for a nonzero force and a passing trajectory. This is forward displacement from a translating localized potential. A zero force gives zero displacement. If the force is negative everywhere on its support, it instead gives ; thus an arbitrary compactly supported force does not satisfy the printed assertion.
There are two complementary explanations of the forward displacement from a translating localized potential. The forward push slows the relative passage and therefore acts longer, while the backward pull speeds up the relative passage and therefore acts for less time. An exact potential energy balance makes the same point: along the trajectory
The moving optical trap supplies the positive work lost to linear drag, although the initial and final potential energy are equal.
For , a uniformly convergent expansion of the passage integrals gives
For a localized potential energy well the first integral vanishes, so
The displacement decreases quadratically with the trap speed, rather than linearly. Without the equal-endpoint assumption the general expansion above remains valid.
For repeated kicks from a circular optical trap, let and interpret the force profile locally along the arc. This description requires a tangential constraint, a nonoverlapping force support , and, if the straight profile is used geometrically, a small support compared with . The condition alone does not specify that latter width hierarchy. During an encounter the particle advances by and the trap advances by . Between encounters the deterministic particle is stationary and the trap travels the remaining relative distance . Thus the time between corresponding points of successive encounters is
Here and are revolution frequencies, not angular velocities; the printed relation fixes this convention. The encounter frequency is , so the same result follows from .
The precise condition for the stated approximation is , in addition to finite passage and separated encounters. A sufficient high-speed regime is with fixed , for which the asymptotic displacement divided by tends to zero. Then
This condition controls the encounter frequency correction; there is no need to discard the finite interaction time without accounting for the support width.
For the triangular optical-trap response, set . In the passing regime , the approach side has velocity and the trailing side has velocity . Consequently
With and , the repeated kicks from a circular optical trap formula becomes
For the usual ideal triangular-well dynamics locks at the cusp: the forces on its two sides direct the trap-frame particle towards the cusp. This is understood as the sticking limit of a rounded potential or of the overdamped differential inclusion at its discontinuous force. The particle follows the trap, giving . At it can remain at a fixed point of the trailing segment and also has . Thus the physical triangular optical-trap response is continuous at threshold, even though the isolated passing-kick displacement diverges there. For ,
and the more general kick approximation requires .
Apply the stationary phase method to the real part of the exponential integral for the Bessel function of the first kind. With fixed, use oscillatory phase and oscillatory integral amplitude . The unique stationary point is , with second derivative . Its contribution is
The leading endpoint terms of the exponential integral are imaginary and do not contribute to its real part. Hence the large-argument asymptotic expansion of the Bessel function of the first kind is
This is an additive asymptotic formula: a relative ratio is inappropriate at zeros of the leading cosine. The envelope decreases like while the oscillation frequency approaches one.
For conservative forcing in averaged oscillator equations, , the average determining vanishes. If , then
whose period average is zero. Thus to this order, while a position-dependent force generally shifts the oscillation phase and frequency. The exact equation also conserves the energy , consistent with the absence of amplitude drift for bounded orbits.
For the cubic position force, . Therefore
The leading oscillation is . For positive it is a softening cubic oscillator, obtained by weakly perturbing a harmonic oscillator. The weak-force condition is ; the constant is the leading harmonic amplitude, not a claim that the exact waveform remains sinusoidal.
The standard thin-disk dissipation flux, summed over both faces, follows by substituting the Keplerian accretion disk profile into the viscous heating rate:
The Stefan–Boltzmann law gives because there are two emitting faces. Local radiative equilibrium consequently gives the effective-temperature profile of a zero-torque disk
Here is the Stefan-Boltzmann constant. The scale is not the temperature exactly at the inner boundary: the zero-torque inner boundary condition makes that formal temperature zero. Maximizing shows that the maximum effective temperature of a zero-torque disk occurs at , with .
At equal central mass and accretion rate, characteristic effective temperatures scale as . Thus, comparing corresponding values of ,
The neutron-star disk is about 180 times hotter. The Planck law and Wien displacement law move its characteristic emission to about 180 times higher frequency, or 180 times shorter wavelength. A white dwarf disk commonly emits in optical and ultraviolet bands, while the hotter neutron star disk can emit in X-rays. Absolute bands require an actual accretion rate; the relative shift follows directly from the stated scaling.