For the Rayleigh-Jeans spectrum of a finite blackbody disk, the Rayleigh-Jeans law replaces by . Here is the Planck constant and the Boltzmann constant. The multitemperature blackbody disk therefore has
For example, setting makes its frequency-independent coefficient proportional to the finite dimensionless integral
Although the exact effective temperature vanishes at the inner edge, the very narrow cold rim where the Rayleigh-Jeans law fails makes a negligible contribution in this limit. More formally, after dividing the integrand by , the inequality bounds it by , so dominated convergence justifies the result even at that edge.
At large radius, , and the contribution per logarithmic interval is . The outer disk dominates the low-frequency emission because its much greater area outweighs its lower effective temperature.
For intermediate frequencies use the allowed power-law approximation to the effective temperature and introduce
Then
so
The lower limit is much smaller than one and the upper limit much larger than one. Extending them to zero and infinity leaves a constant: near zero the integrand behaves as , and at infinity it decays exponentially. Hence the intermediate spectrum is
This is the one-third spectrum of a multitemperature disk. Much of the emission comes from radii where is of order , moving inward as the frequency rises. With the exact inner-edge profile, a broad intermediate interval also requires frequency well below ; the supplied approximation captures its slope away from the hottest annuli.
For a slowly rotating central star, the accretion-disk boundary layer radiates a luminosity . A layer of thickness comparable to the disk scale height has emitting area times a geometric constant. Applying the Stefan–Boltzmann law to this blackbody area gives
Comparing with gives the boundary-layer temperature scaling
Only the scaling is fixed: for a two-faced annulus of area , for example, . A surface belt gives a different order-one coefficient.
For a thin disk, , so a comparable luminosity emerges from a smaller emitting area at a higher effective temperature. The boundary-layer emission is harder than the disk emission, with its Planck law peak shifted to higher frequency. It is also closer to a single-temperature component than the broad multitemperature blackbody disk spectrum, under the adopted uniform-temperature approximation. Rapid stellar rotation weakens the heating and this conclusion's temperature contrast.
For a local axisymmetric Fourier mode, the Toomre stability criterion balances three contributions to the squared oscillation frequency:
The radial epicyclic frequency supplies rotational restoration at long wavelengths; isothermal sound speed and pressure stabilize short wavelengths; disk self-gravity destabilizes intermediate wavelengths. Minimizing over gives and . Axisymmetric gravitational instability occurs when .
In a centrally dominated Keplerian disk, and vertical hydrostatic equilibrium gives . Using and a local disk-mass estimate ,
This is the disk mass form of the Toomre criterion. An actual enclosed mass depends on the radial surface density profile and changes an order-one coefficient. In particular, a profile proportional to has when its inner cutoff is negligible.
For the protosolar estimate, take . This solar mass is implicit in identifying the central star with the young Sun. The supplied constant disk aspect ratio gives
Using the printed approximate astronomical unit and gravitational constant, one can also obtain and ; they give the same . The gravitational constant cancels from the mass form.
At one astronomical unit the disk is very stable, with . Formal extrapolation gives
This is far beyond the planetary region and any plausible extent of the minimum-mass solar nebula. Moreover, the extrapolated enclosed disk mass is already a substantial fraction of a solar mass, so the centrally dominated approximation becomes questionable. The formal radius is not a prediction of a real unstable outer nebula. Direct gas fragmentation by gravitational instability is unlikely to have formed Solar System planets in this model. Core accretion is the more natural route; an earlier substantially more massive or colder disk would be a different model. Even alone does not guarantee fragmentation, because sufficiently rapid cooling is also needed.
For a two-dimensional internal gravity wave with fixed horizontal wave number , the vertical velocity amplitude satisfies
This follows from the Linearized Boussinesq equations just as in part (a), allowing the background buoyancy frequency to vary. The WKB approximation gives locally
It requires slowly varying stratification compared with the local vertical wavelength, in particular , and a small-amplitude wave in the inviscid, nonrotating regime. Propagation requires ; where , the local vertical wave number is imaginary and the solution is evanescent. Turning levels and abrupt changes need a separate connection calculation. Finite viscosity, background flow, rotation or nonlinear effects require modifications of this model.
The ray tracing equations use the local dispersion relation as a Hamiltonian:
The stationary, horizontally uniform background conserves the frequency and horizontal wave number. In two dimensions the group velocity gives . For the specified buoyancy frequency and , . Hence for the two geometric internal-wave rays through the specified point are
Each curve has both directed propagation senses, giving four local directed rays. Their formal intersections with are and .
At , and : this is a double-zero internal-wave turning level, since touches zero without changing sign. The ray becomes vertical geometrically, but its group velocity tends to zero. Taking without loss of generality, the downward branch has
The formal travel time diverges logarithmically as . Meanwhile grows, so the WKB approximation fails before that limit; its predicted amplitude cannot be extrapolated to infinity. The spatial ray reaches a finite limiting position, but finite-wavelength behaviour near the zero must be found beyond WKB. There is no evanescent half-space supplied by this particular , so ordinary simple-turning-point reflection cannot be assumed solely from the local ray construction.
Use the spatial internal-wave ray tracing model, with , and reflect the rays so that the frequency and tangential wave number are preserved. At a vertical wall the horizontal energy direction reverses; at a horizontal wall the vertical energy direction reverses. On the sloping wall the reflection depends on internal-wave slope criticality. The three-reflection orbit below encounters that wall at a height above , so the wall reverses the horizontal energy direction there.
First take the packet to leave the bottom upward and to the left, with . The four segments of the loop are
The left-wall reflection is at and the top reflection at . The slope intersection solves , giving the internal-wave ray return map
Thus the next formal bottom reflection is at . On , the slope heights are between approximately and , consistent with the assumed reflection type.
An internal-wave attractor is a stable periodic ray, so solve . This gives , and therefore
The successive vertices are
This is clockwise circulation in the plane. Differentiating the internal-wave ray return map shows
Neighbouring bottom intersections converge to the periodic orbit, geometrically focusing the energy beam.
For completeness, the opposite upward launch direction has the reversed three-reflection itinerary: slope, top, left. In the interval where this itinerary is valid, put
The three-reflection reverse map is , with domain . Its fixed point is the same, but . Counterclockwise packets defocus from that orbit. Except for the exactly periodic reverse ray, they eventually leave this itinerary. In the full geometric reflection construction, omitted-side or additional-slope reflections redirect generic rays into the clockwise attracting branch. Tangency and exactly critical reflections are singular exceptions requiring finite-wavelength or dissipative treatment.
Figure 1.
Clockwise spatial internal-wave attractor and convergence of neighbouring ray loops in the trapezoidal basin
. Details.
The bottom reflection is a formal spatial-ray idealization: part (b) shows that the WKB approximation itself fails near , so the diagram does not imply arrival and reflection there in finite WKB travel time. In a real fluid, viscous attenuation of an internal-wave beam, finite wavelength, internal-wave breaking and ensuing turbulence and mixing limit the beam width and energy density. Unlimited focusing is a property of the ideal geometric model, not a prediction for the resolved physical wave.
Define outgoing Eddington-Finkelstein coordinates by . The radial Schwarzschild metric becomes
Outgoing radio rays have constant . Two nearby wave crests emitted at Alice's proper times and have separation . At Bob's fixed radius , and , where . Thus the exact local redshift is
Here the wavelength ratio equals the proper time period ratio in geometric optics. Equivalently, the phase gradient gives Alice's measured frequency and Bob's .
In the asymptotically distant-observer limit , this becomes . “Far away” is the approximation behind the printed formula; at finite the factor remains.
For nonzero , the equilibrium points satisfy . The equilibrium point is stable: it puts the bead at the point farthest from the rotation axis. Writing small in the tangential ordinary differential equation gives
Thus the small oscillation is simple harmonic motion, with angular frequency and ordinary frequency .
The endpoints represent the same rim point . A perturbation there instead satisfies and is unstable. Equivalently, the centrifugal potential along the hoop is , whose minimum is at zero and maximum at . If , every bead position with zero relative velocity is an equilibrium point, but perturbing that velocity produces unrestored drift; there is no nonzero restoring frequency.
Write and , so the PDF's vector potential vorticity is . The local TeX loses some of this boldface. Taking the vertical curl of the momentum equation gives , while mass conservation gives . Thus
This is the linear perturbation of shallow-water potential vorticity, scaled by ; it should not be confused with the full nonlinear conserved ratio .
Since , taking the divergence of momentum gives . Differentiate mass conservation and use to obtain
For , substitution of the stated plane wave gives the linear rotating shallow-water dispersion relation, with :
The two even branches approach at large and have values at . The original dispersion diagram below also compares the speed magnitudes.
Figure 1. . Rotating shallow-water frequency branches and magnitudes of phase velocities and group velocities, with dimensionless wavenumber. Details.
For , the phase velocity and group velocity magnitudes are
The printed convention means the signed phase velocity is and the signed group velocity is . The speed magnitudes above are independent of that sign convention.
For , longer wavelengths have greater phase velocity but smaller group velocity: individual crests and wave packets therefore answer “faster or slower” differently. At long wavelength, , the frequency is nearly the inertial frequency , , and . Rotation has its largest relative effect here, and the waves are strongly dispersive. At short wavelength, , both speeds tend to and rotation gives only a small, weakly dispersive correction. If , the gravity waves are nondispersive, with speed ; at the phase velocity formula is undefined.
The central stratified layer supports upward and downward internal gravity waves, whose counterpropagating components form a standing wave. The unstratified regions support evanescent waves, and the upper disturbance decays as . Consequently the central layer is a stratified internal-wave guide, rather than a source of propagating energy at infinity.
The largest response occurs at its trapped normal mode frequencies. They can be specified without solving the forced problem. Set the boundary forcing to zero to find a free normal mode. The lower solution is proportional to , so continuity of fluid pressure and vertical velocity gives
In the central layer write
The upper Robin boundary condition then gives the exact trapped-mode condition
The left side increases strictly from zero to infinity, so there is one positive root for each ; the frequencies accumulate at zero. This is constructive phase matching after reflection at both ends. The phase shifts from the evanescent waves matter: simply imposing integer half-wavelengths across the stratified layer is generally incorrect.
In the ideal inviscid model, exact resonant forcing has no bounded steady harmonic solution. The undamped normal mode grows secularly under sustained forcing. Weak viscosity or other losses would produce large finite peaks near the displayed frequencies; the linear approximation eventually fails if the disturbance becomes too large.
The illustrated free normal mode has an oscillatory central region and evanescent wave tails. Its lower tail reaches the fixed zero-displacement boundary; its upper tail decays to infinity.
Measure as horizontal displacements from the respective downward equilibrium positions; the absolute horizontal coordinates are and . Each vertical displacement is of second order in its small angle. Thus the spring is horizontal to first order, its extension is , and Hooke's law gives horizontal forces and . Combining these with the linearized simple pendulum restoring force yields
For the normal modes of two spring-coupled equal pendulums, add and subtract these ordinary differential equations. The normal mode coordinates and satisfy
Hence the two natural angular frequencies and displacement patterns are
Ordinary frequencies are and . In the first normal mode, both particles swing together with equal amplitudes and the spring is unextended to first order. In the second normal mode, the particles swing in opposite directions with equal amplitudes, so the spring adds a restoring force and increases the angular frequency.
Figure 1.
The two normal modes: equal displacements together and equal displacements in opposite directions
. Details.
The small-angle approximation reduces ii to , where
The coefficient is positive, so the solution is simple harmonic motion, . Here is the angular frequency; the ordinary frequency and period are
The lowest positive root belongs to the symmetric family and lies in ; all antisymmetric roots are at least . Let . The equation forces its first root to tend to zero: for any fixed , the right side eventually exceeds at , so the decreasing-minus-increasing difference has its zero below .
The Taylor series then gives
Since and , the lowest angular frequency is
Physically, at such a low frequency each half-string is nearly straight. If the mass moves up by , the two slopes are approximately and , so the restoring force is . The resulting harmonic oscillator equation, , has exactly the leading angular frequency above. The next correction from the same expansion is .
For and , the zero-endpoint Dirichlet boundary conditions select the Fourier sine basis functions . Separation of variables gives temporal factors with angular frequencies . Zero initial displacement removes the temporal cosine terms, giving
Differentiating at and using Fourier orthogonality gives
The evaluation property of the given initial velocity means in the sense of a Dirac delta, an idealized impulsively struck fixed-end string. Thus : every even mode vanishes, while the lowest two excited modes have . Their ordinary frequencies and amplitude ratio are
The signed coefficient ratio is . The impulse solution is interpreted as a distributional weak solution, rather than one with a smooth initial velocity.
Figure 1.
The two lowest string modes excited by a midpoint velocity impulse, with their signed relative amplitudes
. Details.
At , the two continuous triangles overlap near zero. Their amplitudes add, giving a central plateau. Explicitly, write for the continuous part of :
There are also the two carrier Dirac delta lines . The last panel of the preceding figure shows this spectrum and the retained central portion. The prescribed strict cutoff removes the carriers and keeps
The values of the ordinary function at individual endpoints do not affect its inverse transform. To handle the carrier lines, one must additionally assign zero filter gain to those lines, as the carrier-rejecting prescription indicates. A discontinuous mask has no canonical product with a Dirac delta at its discontinuity; a different physical boundary gain would leave a corresponding multiple of .
The retained spectrum is real and even. Its inverse Fourier transform is
Integrating the linear factors yields
The removable value is , obtained either by expansion or by integrating . Because the carrier frequency is below the message bandwidth, this is Fourier filtering of overlapping amplitude-modulation sidebands; the usual picture of two isolated bands in single-sideband modulation does not apply without that qualification.
Reality requires . The way it constrains the amplitudes depends on whether the spatial wave number is real or imaginary.
For , is real and even. Complex conjugation interchanges the two exponentials, so comparing independent spatial factors gives
The companion equation is the same constraint with frequency reversed and conjugated. Neither oscillatory spatial branch grows as .
For , put with . Then
Boundedness excludes the growing exponential, and reality then pairs the remaining amplitudes:
These are the two independent low-frequency requirements. At threshold boundedness eliminates the separate linear-in- solution discussed in (ii). The constraints are understood for a Fourier transform representation in which spatial mode amplitudes are well defined; sufficient amplitude integrability also ensures the spectral integral itself is bounded.
At fixed frequency, the transformed equation has characteristic roots , where
For a consistent explicit branch choose
This branch is even in . Away from the two thresholds, the spatial solution is , so Fourier inversion gives
At , the spatial equation has a double zero characteristic root and its full solution is . The two exponentials at represent only its constant part. This isolated-frequency issue does not change an integral with ordinary integrable amplitudes; threshold-supported distributional modes require separate treatment.
Split the inverse transform into the intervals and , and in each case pair the positive-frequency integral with its complex conjugate at negative frequency. The low-frequency pair becomes
since and the decaying spatial factor is real. In the high-frequency positive half, replace by . The negative half is again its conjugate. Combining the two pieces gives
Every integrand satisfies the massive wave equation because . Linearity, and taking the real part, preserve the equation whenever differentiation under the integrals is justified, or distributionally under the corresponding spectral assumptions. The construction is exactly the real bounded Fourier modes of the Klein-Gordon equation decomposition.
The displayed expression uses ordinary spectral amplitudes. If distributions supported at are admitted, a further bounded threshold contribution , independent of , is possible. It is not a missing propagating or evanescent branch of the open frequency intervals.
Use the trigonometric identity and express the cosine as a sum of two complex exponentials. The Fourier transform of each exponential is a shifted Dirac delta distribution:
By linearity,
The original function does not decay and is not absolutely integrable on the real line, so this answer is a tempered distribution, rather than an ordinary convergent Fourier integral. Its three lines represent the constant part and the two opposite spatial frequencies.
For three unit masses, and
The uniform vector has , whereas every vector with coordinate sum zero is annihilated by . One orthonormal choice of normal modes is therefore
If is retained from (b), the angular frequencies are . The equal upper frequencies follow from degenerate normal modes from permutation symmetry: the stiffness is scalar on the two-dimensional sum-zero subspace. In the uniform mode the inter-bar strings do not change length, but all three beam connections stretch, giving the nonzero lower frequency. The motion is an arbitrary sine-cosine superposition of these modes about the gravitational equilibrium.
Put . Differentiating the spring length gives
The springs are unextended at equilibrium, so the quadratic potential energy contains only the squares of these first-order extensions:
The linearized Euler-Lagrange equations are therefore
The stiffness matrix is . Its eigenvector has zero eigenvalue, and every vector whose components sum to zero has eigenvalue . One convenient orthonormal set of normal modes is
Any orthonormal basis of the sum-zero plane is equally valid for the two degenerate normal modes. The general small motion is
The linear drift in the zero mode describes a slow uniform rotation. These are angular frequencies; the ordinary frequencies of the two vibrational modes are .
Figure 1.
Tangential displacement patterns of the three bead normal modes
. Arrows show the signs and relative sizes of the angular displacements in one choice of orthonormal normal modes. The equal-arrow pattern is a rigid rotation, while the two sum-zero patterns have equal nonzero angular frequency. Details.