Generalized coordinates

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In the study of multibody systems, generalized coordinates are a set of coordinates used to
describe the configuration of a system relative to some reference configuration. A restriction for
a set of coordinates to serve as generalized coordinates is that they should uniquely define any
possible configuration of the system relative to the reference configuration.[1] Frequently the
generalized coordinates are chosen to be independent of one another. The number of independent
generalized coordinates is defined by the number of degrees of freedom of the system.[2] The
adjective "generalized" is a holdover from a period when Cartesian coordinates were the
standard.

Apart from practical reasons, any set of generalized coordinates is as good as another. The
physics of the system is independent of the choice. However, there are more and less practical
choices, that is, coordinates that are more or less optimally adapted to the system and make the
solution of its equations of motion easier or more difficult.[3]

The generalized velocities are the time derivatives of the generalized coordinates of the system.

Contents
[hide] [edit] Constraint
 1 Constraint equations equations
 2 Examples
o 2.1 Double pendulum Generalized coordinates may be
o 2.2 Bead on a wire independent (or unconstrained), in
o 2.3 Motion on a surface which case they are equal in number to
the degrees of freedom of the system, or
 3 Generalized velocities and kinetic energy
they may be dependent (or constrained),
 4 Applications of generalized coordinates
related by constraints on and among the
 5 See also coordinates. The number of dependent
 6 References coordinates is the sum of the number of
degrees of freedom and the number of
constraints. For example, the
constraints might take the form of a set of configuration constraint equations:[1]

where qn is the n-th generalized coordinate and i denotes one of a set of constraint equations,
taken here to vary with time t. The constraint equations limit the values available to the set of qn,
and thereby exclude certain configurations of the system.
It can be advantageous to choose independent generalized coordinates, as is done in Lagrangian
mechanics, because this eliminates the need for constraint equations. However, in some
situations, it is not possible to identify an unconstrained set. For example, when dealing with
nonholonomic constraints or when trying to find the force due to any constraint—holonomic or
not, dependent generalized coordinates must be employed. Sometimes independent generalized
coordinates are called internal coordinates because they are mutually independent, otherwise
unconstrained, and together give the position of the system.

A system with m degrees of freedom and n particles whose positions are designated with three
dimensional vectors, , implies the existence of 3n − m scalar constraint equations on those
position variables. Such a system can be fully described by the scalar generalized coordinates,
{q1,q2,...,qm}, and the time, t, if and only if all m {qj} are independent coordinates. For the
system, the transformation from old coordinates to generalized coordinates may be represented
as follows:[4]:260

,
, ...
.

This transformation affords the flexibility in dealing with complex systems to use the most
convenient and not necessarily inertial coordinates. These equations are used to construct
differentials when considering virtual displacements and generalized forces.

[edit] Examples
[edit] Double pendulum
A double pendulum

A double pendulum constrained to move in a plane may be described by the four Cartesian
coordinates {x1, y1, x2, y2}, but the system only has two degrees of freedom, and a more efficient
system would be to use

{q1,q2} = {θ1,θ2},
which are defined via the following relations:

{x1,y1} = {l1sinθ1,l1cosθ1}
{x2,y2} = {l1sinθ1 + l2sinθ2,l1cosθ1 + l2cosθ2}
[edit] Bead on a wire

A bead constrained to move on a wire has only one degree of freedom, and the generalized
coordinate used to describe its motion is often

q1 = l ,
where l is the distance along the wire from some reference point on the wire. Notice that a
motion embedded in three dimensions has been reduced to only one dimension.

[edit] Motion on a surface

A point mass constrained to a surface has two degrees of freedom, even though its motion is
embedded in three dimensions. If the surface is a sphere, a good choice of coordinates would be:

{q1,q2} = {θ,φ},
where θ and φ are the angle coordinates familiar from spherical coordinates. The r coordinate has
been effectively dropped, as a particle moving on a sphere maintains a constant radius.

[edit] Generalized velocities and kinetic energy

Each generalized coordinate qi is associated with a generalized velocity , defined as:

The kinetic energy of a particle is

.
In more general terms, for a system of p particles with n degrees of freedom, this may be written

If the transformation equations between the Cartesian and generalized coordinates

are known, then these equations may be differentiated to provide the time-derivatives to use in
the above kinetic energy equation:

It is important to remember that the kinetic energy must be measured relative to inertial
coordinates. If the above method is used, it means only that the Cartesian coordinates need to be
inertial, even though the generalized coordinates need not be. This is another considerable
convenience of the use of generalized coordinates.

[edit] Applications of generalized coordinates

Such coordinates are helpful principally in Lagrangian mechanics, where the forms of the
principal equations describing the motion of the system are unchanged by a shift to generalized
coordinates from any other coordinate system. The amount of virtual work done along any
coordinate qi is given by:

where is the generalized force in the qi direction. While the generalized force is difficult to
construct 'a priori', it may be quickly derived by determining the amount of work that would be
done by all non-constraint forces if the system underwent a virtual displacement of , with all
other generalized coordinates and time held fixed. This will take the form:

and the generalized force may then be calculated:

.
[edit] See also
 Hamiltonian mechanics
 Virtual work
 Orthogonal coordinates
 Curvilinear coordinates
 Frenet-Serret formulas
 Mass matrix
 Stiffness matrix

[edit] References
1. ^ a b Jerry H. Ginsberg (2008). "§7.2.1 Selection of generalized coordinates". Engineering
dynamics, Volume 10 (3rd ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 397. ISBN 0521883032.
http://books.google.com/books?id=je0W8N5oXd4C&pg=PA397.
2. ^ Farid M. L. Amirouche (2006). "§2.4: Generalized coordinates". Fundamentals of multibody
dynamics: theory and applications. Springer. p. 46. ISBN 0817642366.
http://books.google.com/books?id=_nlEcQYldeIC&pg=PA46.
3. ^ Florian Scheck (2010). "§5.1 Manifolds of generalized coordinates". Mechanics: From
Newton's Laws to Deterministic Chaos (5th ed.). Springer. p. 286. ISBN 3642053696.
http://books.google.com/books?id=yUDo7VptDgIC&pg=PA286.
4. ^ Torby, Bruce (1984). "Energy Methods". Advanced Dynamics for Engineers. HRW Series in
Mechanical Engineering. United States of America: CBS College Publishing. ISBN 0-03-
063366-4.

 Greenwood, Donald T. (1987). Principles of Dynamics (2nd edition ed.). Prentice Hall.
ISBN 0-13-709981-9.
 Wells, D. A. (1967). Schaum's Outline of Lagrangian Dynamics. New York: McGraw-
Hill.

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generalized_coordinates"

Holonomic system (physics)

In classical mechanics a system may be defined as holonomic if all constraints of the system are
holonomic. For a constraint to be holonomic it must be expressible as a function:

The constraint, called a holonomic constraint, depends only on the coordinates and time . It
does not depend on the velocities. A constraint that cannot be expressed in the form shown above
is a nonholonomic constraint.
A nonholonomic constraint has the form given below and is nonintegrable:[3]:261

n is the number of coordinates.

k is the number of constraint equations.
qi are coordinates.
as,i are coefficients.
In order for the above form to be nonholonomic, it is also required that the left hand side neither
be a total differential nor be able to be converted into one, perhaps via an integrating factor.[4]:2-3

For virtual displacements only, the differential form of the constraint is[3]:282

D'Alembert's principle

D'Alembert's principle, also known as the Lagrange–d'Alembert principle, is a statement of

the fundamental classical laws of motion. It is named after its discoverer, the French physicist
and mathematician Jean le Rond d'Alembert. The principle states that the sum of the differences
between the forces acting on a system and the time derivatives of the momenta of the system
itself along any virtual displacement consistent with the constraints of the system, is zero. Thus,
in symbols d'Alembert's principle is written as following,

where

are the applied forces,

is the virtual displacement of the system, consistent with the constraints,

 are the masses of the particles in the system,

are the accelerations of the particles in the system,

  together as products represent the time derivatives of the system momenta, and

is an integer used to indicate (via subscript) a variable corresponding to a particular

i particle.

It is the dynamic analogue to the principle of virtual work for applied forces in a static system
and in fact is more general than Hamilton's principle, avoiding restriction to holonomic systems.
[1]
A holonomic constraint depends only on the coordinates and time. It does not depend on the
velocities. If the negative terms in accelerations are recognized as inertial forces, the statement
of d'Alembert's principle becomes The total virtual work of the impressed forces plus the inertial
forces vanishes for reversible displacements.[2]

This above equation is often called d'Alembert's principle, but it was first written in this
variational form by Joseph Louis Lagrange.[3] D'Alembert's contribution was to demonstrate that
in the totality of a dynamic system the forces of constraint vanish. That is to say that the
generalized forces need not include constraint forces.

Contents
[hide]

 1 Derivation for special cases

 2 D'Alembert's principle of inertial forces
o 2.1 Example for plane 2D motion of a rigid body
 3 References

[edit] Derivation for special cases

To date nobody has shown that D'Alembert's principle is equivalent to Newton's Second Law.
This is true only for some very special cases e.g. rigid body constraints. However there does
exist an approximate solution to this problem.[4]

Consider Newton's law for a system of particles, i. The total force on each particle is[5]

where
 are the total forces acting on the system's particles,

  are the inertial forces that result from the total forces.

Moving the inertial forces to the left gives an expression that can be considered to represent
quasi-static equilibrium, but which is really just a small algebraic manipulation of Newton's law:
[5]

Considering the virtual work, δW, done by the total and inertial forces together through an
arbitrary virtual displacement, , of the system leads to a zero identity, since the forces
involved sum to zero for each particle.[5]

The original vector equation could be recovered by recognizing that the work expression must
hold for arbitrary displacements. Separating the total forces into applied forces, , and
constraint forces, , yields[5]

If arbitrary virtual displacements are assumed to be in directions that are orthogonal to the
constraint forces (which is not usually the case, so this derivation works only for special cases),
the constraint forces do no work. Such displacements are said to be consistent with the
constraints.[6] This leads to the formulation of d'Alembert's principle, which states that the
difference of applied forces and inertial forces for a dynamic system does no virtual work:[5].

There is also a corresponding principle for static systems called the principle of virtual work for
applied forces.

[edit] D'Alembert's principle of inertial forces

D'Alembert showed that one can transform an accelerating rigid body into an equivalent static
system by adding the so-called "inertial force" and "inertial torque" or moment. The inertial force
must act through the center of mass and the inertial torque can act anywhere. The system can
then be analyzed exactly as a static system subjected to this "inertial force and moment" and the
external forces. The advantage is that, in the equivalent static system' one can take moments
about any point (not just the center of mass). This often leads to simpler calculations because any
force (in turn) can be eliminated from the moment equations by choosing the appropriate point
about which to apply the moment equation (sum of moments = zero). Even in the course of
Fundamentals of Dynamics and Kinematics of machines, this principle helps in analyzing the
forces that act on a link of a mechanism when it is in motion. In textbooks of engineering
dynamics this is sometimes referred to as d'Alembert's principle.

[edit] Example for plane 2D motion of a rigid body

For a planar rigid body, moving in the plane of the body (the x–y plane), and subjected to forces
and torques causing rotation only in this plane, the inertial force is

where is the position vector of the centre of mass of the body, and m is the mass of the body.
The inertial torque (or moment) is

where I is the moment of inertia of the body. If, in addition to the external forces and torques
acting on the body, the inertia force acting through the center of mass is added and the inertial
torque is added (acting around the centre of mass is as good as anywhere) the system is
equivalent to one in static equilibrium. Thus the equations of static equilibrium

hold. The important thing is that is the sum of torques (or moments, including the inertial
moment and the moment of the inertial force) taken about any point. The direct application of
Newton's laws requires that the angular acceleration equation be applied only about the center of
mass.

[edit] References
1. ^ Cornelius Lanczos (1970). The variational principles of mechanics (4rth Edition ed.). New York:
Dover Publications Inc.. p. 92. ISBN 0-486-65067-7. http://books.google.com/books?
id=ZWoYYr8wk2IC&pg=PA92&dq=%22d%27Alembert%27s+principle
%22&lr=&as_brr=0&sig=Yi4NGNqeJg0tyluk7bsppBz0MnQ.
2. ^ Cornelius Lanczos (1970). p. 90. ISBN 0-486-65067-7. http://books.google.com/books?
id=ZWoYYr8wk2IC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22d%27Alembert%27s+principle
%22&lr=&as_brr=0#PPA90,M1.
3. ^ Arnold Sommerfeld (1956), Mechanics: Lectures on Theoretical Physics, Vol 1, p. 53
4. ^ Rebhan, Eckhard (2006). "Exkurs 5.1: Ableitung des d'Alembert Prinzips". Mechanik.
Theoretische Physik. Heidelberg, Germany: Spektrum Akademischer Verlag. ISBN 978-3-8274-
1716-9.
5. ^ a b c d e Torby, Bruce (1984). "Energy Methods". Advanced Dynamics for Engineers. HRW Series
in Mechanical Engineering. United States of America: CBS College Publishing. ISBN 0-03-063366-
4.
6. ^ Ing-Chang Jong (2005). "Teaching Students Work and Virtual Work Method in Statics:A Guiding
Strategy with Illustrative Examples" (PDF). Proceedings of the 2005 American Society for
Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition. American Society for Engineering
Education. http://comp.uark.edu/~icjong/docu/05Portland.pdf. Retrieved 2007-09-24.