Module 15 : Vector fields, Gradient, Divergence and Curl

Lecture 44 : Gradient Divergence and Curl [Section 44.1]

Objectives

In this section you will learn the following :

The divergence of a vector field.

Divergence of a vector field.

44.1 Divergence of a vector field

44.1.1 Definition

Let be a differentiable vector-field with components Then, the scalar field

defined by

is called the divergence of the vector-field

44.1.2 Example

1. Divergence of an inverse square vector-field:

Let

Then,

where

It is easy to see that

Thus

As
 we get

2. Let

Then

44.1.3 Example (Continuity equation of fluid flow):

Consider the motion of a fluid in a region in which there are no sources or sinks, i.e., neither the fluid is being produced nor is
destroyed. Let denote the density of the fluid at a point in the region at time In other words, we are
assuming that the fluid is compressible . Let

be the velocity vector field of the fluid . Then, the quantity

is called the flux of the fluid at the point at time Note that, is a vector having same direction as that of
and the magnitude of represents the flow of unit mass of the liquid per unit area, per unit time. This comes from the
dimension considerations of which are

One would like to write the equation of the fluid flow. For this, consider a small portion, a rectangular parallelepiped of
dimensions with sides parallel to axes, in the fluid. We calculate the change in mass in the region by computing the
outward flow.
Figure 167. Fluid flow across a small parallelepiped

The mass of the fluid entering through the face during a short time interval at a point is given by

as is the mass crossing over per unit area, in the positive direction of the axis, in unit time. The mass of the fluid
leaving in the direction of the -axis, across the face is given at a point by

Thus, the net change in mass in the direction of the -axis is given by

Hence, the net change in all directions is given by

where and so on. On the other hand, the rate of change of density is and hence the loss of mass in
time across parallelepiped is

Since there are no sinks or sources, we have, as approaches

i.e.,

i.e.,

This is called the continuity equation of a compressible fluid flow without sinks or sources. The fluid flow is said to be steady ,
if is independent of time. In that case and hence the equation of flow is

If is also a constant, i.e., the fluid has uniform density (incompressible), we have the equation to be This is also
the necessary condition for the incompressibility of the fluid flow.

44.1.4 Visualizing Divergence:

We saw in the previous example that if we treat a vector-field as the velocity-field of a steady flow of an incompressible fluid
flow, then at a point means that the flow has no source or sink. We say fluid flow has source at a point if
at that point and has a sink at a point if at that point.

Thus, if we represent as a vector (arrow), then at a point where there is a sink, there are more arrows going in that
point than the number of arrows that going out of it. At a source point the opposite happens, i.e., there are more arrows going
out than coming in. Or, we can say that the flow is ‘diverging' at that point. One can also treat as a force field. Then as
an arrow indicates the acceleration of a point See an interactive visualization at the end of the section.

44.1.5 Note:

Note that in examples 44.1.2 and 44.1.3, we represented physical quantities in terms of vectors, which of course depend upon
coordinate systems. For example, our definition of divergence depended upon the vector representation

of the vector field Does that mean that physical phenomenon depend upon the choice of coordinates? One can show that this
is not so. In fact, all that quantities like dot-product, cross product, divergence are independent of the choice of coordinates.

44.1.6 Symbolic representation of divergence:

Recall that, the divergence of a scalar field was represented using the operator

We can use this operator to represent divergence of a vector field. For a vector field

where the last equality is as if we have taken the dot product of with One also writes above as

We describe next the properties of divergence with respect to various operations.

44.1.7 Theorem:

Let be differentiable scalar fields and be a differentiable vector field. Then the following hold:

1. .
 2. .

3.

4.

where

is called the Laplacian of

5.

Proof of (i), (ii) are easy and are left as exercises. To prove (iii), note that

The identity (iv) follows from (iii) with Finally, to prove (v) note that, using scalar triple product, we get

In part (iv) of the above theorem, for a vector field the vector

plays an important role in various representations. We shall analyze it next. This also gives a method of generating new vector-
fields out of given ones.
44.1.8 Definition

Let

be a vector-field in a domain . Define a vector field by

This is called the curl of the vector field Another convenient representation of is the following.

Here, is treated as a vector with components and is treated as the cross product. We also write

44.1.9 Note:

Once again, through the definition of is in terms of components of which depend upon the choice of a coordinate
system, one can show that the definition of does not depend upon the choice of the coordinate system.

We give an example to illustrate the importance for curl operator.

44.1.10 Example:

We saw in example 43.12 (ii), that for the rotation of a rigid body about an axis in space,its velocity vector at a point is given
by

where is a vector along the axis of rotation and is the position vector of In case we choose the coordinate system to be
right handed cartesian coordinates with axis along the axis of rotation with where is the angular speed, then
Thus,

i.e., there is no rotation of the body.

The above example motivates our next definition.

44.1.11 Definition:

A vector field is said to be irrotational if

44.1.12 Example:

1. Let .

Then

Hence, is irrotational.

(ii) Let be any vector-field which has a potential i.e., for every

for some twice continuously differentiable scalar field

Then
 Thus, is irrotational. Hence, we have shown that every vector-field which has a potential is irrotational.

We state next some properties of the curl operator which show that it behaves like a differential operator.

44.1.13 Theorem:

Let be continuously differentiable vector-fields and a continuously differentiable Scalar-fields. Then the following hold:

1.

2.

3. where

and

1.

2.
 3.

Now using the identity

we get

Visualization of Divergence
Visualization of rotational vector fields

For Quiz refer the WebSite.

Practice Exercises

1. Calculate the divergence of the following:

1.

2.

3. , where

Answer:

(i) .
 (ii)

(iii)

2. Calculate the curl of the following:

1.

2. , where ,

3. Where .

Answer:

(i)

(ii)

(iii)

3. Let

and let

Prove the following:

1.

2.

3.

4. For and as in exercise (3) above, show that

1.

2.

3.

5. Show that the vector field

is not incompressible.
 6. Show that the following vector fields are not conservative:

1. .

2. .

7. Show that the following vector fields are not irrotational:

1.

2. .

Recap

In this section you have learnt the following

The divergence of a vector field.