With the momentum-flux sign convention used for the Maxwell stress tensor, Maxwell's equations imply
where is the electromagnetic momentum density and is the Lorentz force density exerted by the field on matter. Thus total field-plus-matter momentum is locally conserved.
For a Cartesian change of basis represented by an orthogonal matrix , vectors transform as and . Their squared norms are invariant and . Substitution into the given expression therefore gives
the transformation law of a Cartesian second-rank tensor. The magnetic field's extra axial sign under an improper physical reflection, if included, appears twice and cancels in its quadratic contribution.
Write the Maxwell stress tensor as . Its divergence is
The identity follows by contracting two Levi-Civita symbols, or directly by differentiating components. Using Maxwell's equations consequently yields
Hence the local conservation of electromagnetic momentum is
The two subtracted terms are the Lorentz force density, while is the electromagnetic momentum density in the units used here.
The magnetic field satisfies . Expanding the divergence of its Maxwell stress tensor gives
For the Newtonian gravitational field , Poisson equation for Newtonian gravity gives , and the gradient representation gives . Consequently
The negative of the Newtonian gravitational stress tensor, in this force-stress convention, therefore supplies . Adding the pressure stress supplies , so
Each summand is symmetric. Absence of external gravitational sources is needed to represent the full gravitational force by this self-gravitating stress.
The Maxwell equations with vacuum permittivity and permeability give and . The current identity is the Ampère-Maxwell equation, and Faraday's law gives . With ,
The identity , and its electric analogue, turn this into the divergence of the Maxwell stress tensor . Thus the tensor in the question is its negative:
The vector is electromagnetic momentum density, and is the outward flux of its th component across a surface normal in the direction. In static conditions the total force on matter is ; generally subtract the time derivative of the enclosed electromagnetic field momentum as well.
For the two infinite sheets, superposition and the electromagnetic field jumps give , between them and zero outside. Substitution yields exactly
A thin pillbox enclosing the sheet has only its face in the interior electromagnetic field. Therefore
Directly, omit the sheet's self-electromagnetic field: the other sheet supplies and . The Lorentz force per area is , giving the same result. The electric contribution is attractive and the magnetic contribution repulsive.
If for a single moving charge population, use to obtain . For physical this is attractive, so motion of these charges cannot make the force repulsive. Independently imposed currents need not satisfy that restriction on .
Use for inward mass accretion rate, and for magnetic torque adding angular momentum to the disk. Combining the continuity equation with conservation of angular momentum identifies the inward mass flux as . In a steady Keplerian accretion disk, this is the supplied constant , so
The boundary condition is . Since , the viscous torque in an accretion disk is . Hence the steady Keplerian accretion disk with an inner torque has
In particular, . For a physical steady solution with this boundary condition, .
For , the surface density of a disk rises from a small inner value toward : this is the usual Keplerian accretion disk with an approximately zero-torque inner boundary condition. For , the inner surface density of a disk is large and decreases approximately as , giving a torque-dominated accretion disk. This approximation applies where ; sufficiently far out, any fixed finite again approaches the same constant asymptote.
Figure 1.
Steady surface-density profiles with weak and strong inner torques
.
The constant net inward angular-momentum flux is
For , net angular momentum moves outward. The strong-torque profile is therefore decretion disk-like in its stress-dominated structure, but the specified mass flux remains inward: a genuine net decretion disk requires an outward mass flux, not merely large .
At , the Maxwell stress tensor estimate gives
Using the magnetospheric truncation radius scaling in part (b), all dimensional parameters cancel:
If the displayed is retained and the scaling radius is assigned unit coefficient, the estimate is ; retaining and exact free-fall speed throughout gives . Those prefactors are not controlled by the scaling argument. In particular, it does not generate a parametrically large .
Let be the stated Maxwell stress tensor. Taking its divergence and using
gives
The Maxwell equations in vacuum with sources are
Substitution, together with antisymmetry of the cross product, yields
Therefore the required vector is the electromagnetic momentum density
and
This is local conservation of electromagnetic momentum. The tensor component is the flux of -momentum in the direction in the convention of the question, is field momentum per unit volume, and is the Lorentz force density transferred to matter.
Differentiate , use the vacuum Maxwell equations, and use . Componentwise vector identities then give
where
This is the negative of the conventional Maxwell stress tensor; with the sign used here, its divergence is the outward momentum flux.
Differentiating , substituting Maxwell equations, and using the stated vector identity gives the Maxwell stress tensor conservation law
Moving the divergence to the left identifies