PHYS UN3008 - Electromagnetic Waves & Optics

The First Few Lectures

John Staunton
January 20, 2021
Columbia University

Contents
1 Lecture 1: Completing Maxwell’s Equations 1
1.1 The Electromotive Force . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 Faraday’s Law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

2 Lecture 2: Completing Maxwell’s Equations Part 2 3

2.1 Applying Faraday’s Law . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2.2 The Maxwell Displacement Current . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2.3 Maxwell’s Equations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
2.4 Energy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

3 Lecture 3: 6
3.1 Energy and Flow of Energy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
3.2 Electromagnetic Potentials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
1 Lecture 1: Completing Maxwell’s Equations
1.1 The Electromotive Force
So far, we have only dealt with static or steady state circumstances. In this chapter, we are going to complete Maxwell’s
equations to include time dependence. The static Maxwell equations in the vacuum are,
𝜌
∇⋅E= , ∇ × E = 0,
𝜖0 (1)
∇ ⋅ B = 0, ∇ × B = 𝜇0 J.

In a media, with displacement vector D = 𝜖E and magnetic field B = 𝜇H,

∇ ⋅ D = 𝜌𝑓 , ∇ × E = 0,
(2)
∇ ⋅ B = 0, ∇ × H = J𝑓 .

Our goal is to introduce the correct time-dependence into these equations. Suppose we have a source, say a battery,
attached to the two ends of a conducting, but not perfectly conducting, wire. A current will flow in the wire. There will
be an electric field in the wire to overcome the resistance and there will be a force per unit charge due to the source f𝑠 .
The total force per unit charge is, therefore, f = f𝑠 + E, where f𝑠 is limited to the small region of the source. See below,

The electromotive force is defined to be,

ℰ= f ⋅ dx = f𝑠 ⋅ dx + E ⋅ dx . (3)
∫𝐶 ∫𝐶 ∫𝐶

The second term can be rewritten using Stoke’s theorem,

ℰ= f𝑠 ⋅ dx + ∇ × E ⋅ dS . (4)
∫𝐶 ∫𝑆

But, in the static case, ∇ × E = 0, so, the electromotive force is,

ℰ= f𝑠 ⋅ dx . (5)
∫𝐶

In the above calculation, 𝐶 is the direction of the current flow and 𝑆 is the surface enclosed by the current.

1.2 Faraday’s Law

̂ (−𝑦), where Θ is a distribution defined as,
Suppose we have a magnetic field for 𝑦 < 0, B = 𝐵xΘ

1 𝑥 > 0,
Θ (𝑥) = . (6)
{0 𝑥<0

Suppose we also have a long closed wire in the 𝑥𝑧-plane, as shown below, which moves to the right at a velocity 𝑣.

1
There is a force on charges in the wire,
F = 𝑞 (E + v × B) . (7)
Or, f = −𝑣𝐵 (ŷ × x)̂ = −𝑣𝐵z,̂ so a current will flow according to the arrows in the figure. Let’s calculate the electro-
motive force,
ℰ= f ⋅ dx = 𝑣𝐵ℎ, (8)
∫𝐶
where 𝐶 is taken in the counter clockwise direction. Define the magnetic flux going through 𝑆 as,

Φ= B ⋅ dS . (9)
∫𝑆

Then, Φ = 𝐵𝑙ℎ and

dΦ
− = 𝐵𝑣ℎ. (10)
d𝑡
So, the electromotive force is given by Faraday’s Law, which says a change in flux creates an emf,

dΦ
ℰ =− . (11)
d𝑡
Note here the force f𝑠 is due to the magnetic field. However, if we fixed the wire and moved at velocity 𝑣 the boundary
of the magnetic field in the direction of the 𝑦-axis the physical situation is the same. But, now the force must be electric
and so we might expect,
dΦ 𝜕B
E ⋅ dx = − =− ⋅ dS . (12)
∫ 𝐶 d𝑡 ∫ 𝑆 𝜕𝑡
Note that this results from the derivation did in the previous subsection. There is no source term, so the stat case
predicts there is no electromotive force. Instead, where we went wrong was in setting the curl term to be 0. Instead, it
should be equation to the electromotive force we found in this problem. Using Stoke’s theorem on the left hand side,
we have our new adjusted Maxwell equation,
𝜕B
∇×E=− . (13)
𝜕𝑡

2
2 Lecture 2: Completing Maxwell’s Equations Part 2
2.1 Applying Faraday’s Law
We will apply Faraday’s law in two examples. The first example takes a magnetic field B = 𝐵(𝑡)ẑ going through a loop
of wire of radius 𝑠, shown below. What is the induced electric field in this wire?

We proceed by complete analogy to Ampere’s law. For Ampere’s law if the source, which is a current, was pointing in
z,̂ we’d use the right hand rule to find that the magnetic field goes in the counter clockwise direction. The same is true
here. The source, which is the magnetic field, goes in the ẑ direction, so E = 𝐸𝜑 𝜑.̂
Next, we plug it into the integral version of Faraday’s law, which you should note is very similar to Ampere’s law as
well,
𝜕B
E ⋅ dx = − ⋅ dS . (14)
∫ ∫ 𝜕𝑡
The left hand side will simple be 𝐸𝜑 2𝜋𝑠, the right hand side will be −𝜕𝑡 𝐵𝜋𝑠2 . So,

1 d𝐵
𝐸𝜑 = − . (15)
2 d𝑡

As a second example, let’s look at a current 𝐼 that flows along the 𝑦-axis, 𝐼 = 𝐼(𝑡). Assume it is slowly varying. We
want to know what is the induced field in the wire, as shown below,

As a rule of thumb, the electric field will go in the same direction as the current. So, the electric field will be along the
legs of the rectangular loop parallel to the 𝑦-axis and not along 𝑧. So, the below line integral will have two contributions,

E ⋅ dx = (𝐸 (𝑠) − 𝐸 (𝑠0 )) 𝑙, (16)

∫
where 𝑠0 is the distance from the 𝑦-axis to the bottom of the wire and 𝑠 is the distance to the top of the wire. Finally,
since 𝑠 is close to 𝑠0 , we can use a Taylor series,
d𝐸 d𝐸
𝐸 (𝑠) = 𝐸 (𝑠0 ) + 𝑠 − 𝑠0 ) ⇒ (𝐸 (𝑠) − 𝐸 (𝑠0 )) 𝑙 = 𝑠 − 𝑠0 ) 𝑙. (17)
d𝑠 ( d𝑠 (

3
For the right hand side, we note that according to Faraday’s law the magnetic field a distance 𝑧 above the 𝑦-axis is,
𝜇0 𝐼
𝐵= . (18)
2𝜋𝑧
We can therefore compute the right hand side of Faraday’s law by noting that the infinitesimal area parallel to the
magnetic field is of magnitude d𝑦 d𝑧,

𝜕B 𝜇 d𝐼 d𝑦 d𝑧
− ⋅ dS = 0 . (19)
∫ 𝜕𝑡 2𝜋 d𝑡 ∫ 𝑧
The minus sign goes away because the magnetic field is in the −x̂ direction. The integral over 𝑦 is just the length, 𝑙.
The integral over 𝑧 is going to be a natural logarithm. So,

𝜕B 𝜇 𝑙 d𝐼 𝑠
− ⋅ dS = 0 ln . (20)
∫ 𝜕𝑡 2𝜋 d𝑡 𝑠0

We can rewrite 𝑠/𝑠0 as 1 + (𝑠 − 𝑠0 )/𝑠0 . Then, use ln(1 + 𝑥) ∼ 𝑥 to obtain,

𝜕B 𝜇 𝑙 d𝐼 𝑠 − 𝑠0
− ⋅ dS = 0 . (21)
∫ 𝜕𝑡 2𝜋 d𝑡 𝑠0

Using this in addition to (17), we see that 𝑠 − 𝑠0 cancels as well as the 𝑙 and we are left with, setting 𝑠0 = 𝑠,

d𝐸 𝜇 d𝐼 1
= 0 . (22)
d𝑠 2𝜋 d𝑡 𝑠
Solving this first order differential equation, we find that for some reference point 𝑠1 ,

𝜇0 d𝐼 𝑠
𝐸 (𝑠, 𝑡) = ln + 𝐸 (𝑠1 , 𝑡) . (23)
2𝜋 d𝑡 𝑠1

2.2 The Maxwell Displacement Current

Let’s see that this must also occurs in ∇ × B. In magnetostatics, we had ∇ × B = 𝜇0 J. Since we will shortly see that
this cannot be true when there are time dependences, let’s add a term to the right hand side of the above and try and
determine it. Try,
𝜕X
∇ × B = 𝜇0 𝐽 + . (24)
𝜕𝑡
Then, the divergence of a curl is 0, so taking the divergence of both sides we get,
𝜕
0 = 𝜇0 ∇ ⋅ J + ∇ ⋅ X. (25)
𝜕𝑡
By the continuity equation, ∇ ⋅ J = −𝜕𝑡 𝜌, so
𝜕𝜌 𝜕
𝜇0 = ∇ ⋅ X. (26)
𝜕𝑡 𝜕𝑡
Then, we can replace 𝜌 by 𝜖0 ∇ ⋅ E and obtain,

𝜕 𝜕
𝜇 0 𝜖0 ∇ ⋅ E = ∇ ⋅ X. (27)
𝜕𝑡 𝜕𝑡
As such, X = 𝜇0 𝜖0 E so that,
𝜕E
∇ × B = 𝜇 0 J + 𝜇 0 𝜖0 . (28)
𝜕𝑡
The second term is called the Maxwell Displacement Current.

4
2.3 Maxwell’s Equations
The full set of Maxwell’s equations are now,

𝜌 𝜕B
∇⋅E= , ∇×E=− ,
𝜖0 𝜕𝑡 (29)
𝜕E
∇ ⋅ B = 0, ∇ × B = 𝜇 0 J + 𝜇 0 𝜖0 .
𝜕𝑡

In a media, with displacement vector D = 𝜖E and magnetic field B = 𝜇H,

𝜕B
∇ ⋅ D = 𝜌𝑓 , ∇×E=− ,
𝜕𝑡 (30)
∇ ⋅ B = 0, 𝜕D
∇ × H = J𝑓 + .
𝜕𝑡

2.4 Energy
The force on a charged particle is given by the Lorentz force, F = 𝑞 (E + v × B). The work done by the fields on the
particle is,
d𝑊
F ⋅ dx = 𝑞 (E + v × B) ⋅ v d𝑡 ⇒ = 𝑞E ⋅ v. (31)
d𝑡
For a general set of particles,
d𝑊
= J (x, 𝑡) ⋅ E (x, 𝑡) d3 𝑥 . (32)
d𝑡 ∫𝑉

5
3 Lecture 3:
3.1 Energy and Flow of Energy
To review what we did last week, we start off with the Lorentz force,
F = 𝑞 (E + v × B) . (33)
The infinitesimal work done is d𝑊 = F ⋅ dx, so
d𝑊 = 𝑞 (E + v × B) ⋅ dx . (34)
Then, we use dx = v d𝑡. But, v × B is perpendicular to v, so that term will go away when we take the dot product,
leaving behind,
d𝑊 = 𝑞E ⋅ v d𝑡 . (35)
The key takeaway here is that magnetic fields do no work. In general, we note that 𝑞v generalizes to a current in the
continuum or many-particle limit, leaving us with,
d𝑊
= J (x, 𝑡) ⋅ E (x, 𝑡) d3 𝑥 . (36)
d𝑡 ∫
Recall that for a single particle, J = 𝑞v (𝑡) 𝛿 3 (x − x (𝑡)).
Next, let’s use one of Maxwell’s equations,
1 𝜕E
∇ × B = J + 𝜖0 , (37)
𝜇0 𝜕𝑡
and isolate J. We can plug in J into our equation for the power, d𝑊 / d𝑡 and obtain,
d𝑊 𝜕E 1
= E ⋅ −𝜖0 + ∇ × B d3 𝑥 . (38)
d𝑡 ∫ [ 𝜕𝑡 𝜇0 ]
Next, we note that,
𝜕E 1 𝜕𝐸 2
E⋅ = , (39)
𝜕𝑡 2 𝜕𝑡
where 𝐸 2 = E ⋅ E. Plugging this in, we get
d𝑊 𝜖 d 1
=− 0 𝐸 2 (x, 𝑡) d3 𝑥 + E ⋅ ∇ × B d3 𝑥 . (40)
d𝑡 2 d𝑡 ∫ 𝜇0 ∫
It is good practice to start using index notation to simplify this second integral. Note that a cross product can be written
using the Levi-Civita tensor,

⎧1 (𝑖, 𝑗, 𝑘) = (1, 2, 3) and cyclic permutation,

⎪
𝜖𝑖𝑗𝑘 = ⎨−1 (𝑖, 𝑗, 𝑘) = (2, 1, 3) and cyclic permutations, (41)
⎪0 otherwise,
⎩
as
(𝑣 × 𝑤)𝑖 = 𝜖𝑖𝑗𝑘 𝑣𝑗 𝑤𝑘 , (42)
where summing over 𝑗 and 𝑘 from 1 to 3 is assumed. Therefore,
E ⋅ ∇ × B → 𝜖𝑖𝑗𝑘 𝐸𝑖 𝜕𝑗 𝐵𝑘 ,
= 𝜖𝑖𝑗𝑘 𝜕𝑗 (𝐸𝑖 𝐵𝑘 ) − 𝜖𝑖𝑗𝑘 𝐵𝑘 𝜕𝑗 𝐸𝑖 ,
= −𝜖𝑗𝑖𝑘 𝜕𝑗 (𝐸𝑖 𝐵𝑘 ) + 𝜖𝑘𝑗𝑖 𝐵𝑘 𝜕𝑗 𝐸𝑖 ,
→ −∇ ⋅ (E × B) + B ⋅ ∇ × E, (43)
𝜕B
= −∇ ⋅ (E × B) − B ⋅ ,
𝜕𝑡
1 𝜕𝐵 2
= −∇ ⋅ (E × B) − .
2 𝜕𝑡

6
In the first line, I rewrote the vector form into index notation. In the second line, I used the product rule. In the third
line, I switched the indices in the 𝜖 tensor. Recall that 𝜖𝑖𝑗𝑘 = −𝜖𝑗𝑖𝑘 . Upon writing this, in the fourth line, I would note
that the first term has a cross product between E and B while in the last term we get a curl of E. Then, in the fifth line,
I used Maxwell’s equations to write the time derivative of B. In the last line, I used the same manipulation as (39).
Therefore, the power can be written as,
d𝑊 𝜖 d 1 d 1
=− 0 𝐸 2 (x, 𝑡) d3 𝑥 − 𝐵 2 (x, 𝑡) d3 𝑥 − ∇ ⋅ (E × B) d3 𝑥 . (44)
d𝑡 2 d𝑡 ∫ 2𝜇0 d𝑡 ∫ 𝜇0 ∫
In the last term, we note that by Gauss’ theorem, the volume integral of a divergence can be turned into a surface
integral,
d𝑊 d 𝜖0 2 1 2 3
=− 𝐸 + 𝐵 d 𝑥− S ⋅ dA , (45)
d𝑡 d𝑡 ∫ [ 2 2𝜇0 ] ∮
where we have defined the Poynting vector,
1
S= E × B, (46)
𝜇0
and dA is the infinitesimal area.
We physically interpret the first integral as the flow of the internal energy density, i.e. the work of the field done by the
charges. The second term is the Poynting vector, or the flow of energy over an area. In other words, the flow of energy
out of some volume (given by the Poynting vector) is equal to the rate of change of the internal field energy inside the
volume. The way of writing it differentially is,

d4 𝑊 𝜕𝑢
− = + ∇ ⋅ S, (47)
d𝑡 d3 𝑥 𝜕𝑡
where 𝑢 is the electromagnetic energy density. If energy is conserved, the energy conservation law is,

𝜕𝑢
+ ∇ ⋅ S = 0. (48)
𝜕𝑡

In magnetostatics, we can get an alternative form for energy. Let’s look,

1 1
𝐸𝐵 = 𝐵 2 d3 𝑥 = B ⋅ ∇ × A d3 𝑥 , (49)
2𝜇0 ∫ 2𝜇0 ∫
where we used the magnetic vector potential, A. If we look back at (43), we see that,
B ⋅ ∇ × A = −∇ ⋅ (B × A) + A ⋅ ∇ × B. (50)
Lastly, we can use Ampere’s Law in Maxwell’s equations to write,
B ⋅ ∇ × A = −∇ ⋅ (B × A) + 𝜇0 A ⋅ J (51)
Plugging this in and immediately using Gauss’ law to rewrite the volume integral as a surface integral, we get,
1 1
𝐸𝐵 = − B × A da + A ⋅ J d3 𝑥 , (52)
2𝜇0 ∮ 2∫
where da is now the infinitesimal area element (sorry for all the changes in notation). But, we are integrating over
an infinite volume, and all the fields should go to 0 infinitely far away, so the first term is 0. After this, we’ll use the
definition of A in terms of the current:
𝜇 J (x′ ) 3 ′
A= 0 d 𝑥 , (53)
4𝜋 ∫ |x − x′ |
in order to obtain a final expression for the total magnetic energy,
′
𝜇0 J (x) ⋅ J (x ) 3 3 ′
𝐸𝐵 = d 𝑥d 𝑥 . (54)
8𝜋 ∫ |x − x′ |

7
As a side note, this is actually a super important form to remember if you want to take Quantum field theory. We think
of J as a source term and the following as a propagator (or Green’s function),
1
𝐺 (x, x′ ) = . (55)
4𝜋|x − x′ |
For a moment, let me set 𝜇0 = 1. In that case, the energy density take the form,
d𝐸
∼ 𝐽 𝐺𝐽 ′ d3 𝑥′ . (56)
d𝑉 ∫
We read this as a source term releasing information and propagating it to some other source term via the propagator G.
Stuff goes from point A to point B and this contains the energy. The interaction between sources and fields in this way
allows you to obtain results in QFT. Anyway, back to the lecture.

Example (Coaxial Cable): Consider a coaxial cable of inner radius 𝑎 and outer radius 𝑏 with current 𝐼 at both of these
positions in opposite directions going along the ẑ direction. What is the magnetic energy per unit length stored in the
cylinder?

We need to find what B is. The cylindrical radius is 𝜌 and that is how we will separate the sections. Using Ampere’s
law, we see that there is no magnetic field outside the cylinder, 𝜌 > 𝑏, since the enclosed current is 0. When 𝑎 < 𝜌 < 𝑏,
𝜇0 𝐼
𝐵𝜑 = . (57)
2𝜋𝜌
When 𝜌 < 𝑎, there’s also no enclosed current so the field is 0. Therefore, the energy is,

1 1 𝜇02 𝐼 2
𝐸𝐵 = 𝐵 2 d3 𝑥 = 𝜌 d𝜌 d𝜑 d𝑧 . (58)
2𝜇0 ∫ 2𝜇0 ∫ 4𝜋 2 𝜌2
We want to find the energy per unit length, so we can differentiate with respect to 𝑏 and integrate 𝜑 from 0 to 2𝜋,

d𝐸𝐵 𝜇 𝐼 2 𝑏 d𝜌 𝜇0 𝐼 2 𝑏
= 0 = ln . (59)
d𝑧 4𝜋 ∫ 𝑎 𝜌 4𝜋 𝑎
So, the energy per unit length is given by,
d𝐸𝐵 𝜇 𝐼2 𝑏
= 0 ln . (60)
d𝑧 4𝜋 𝑎

3.2 Electromagnetic Potentials

We’re using Maxwell’s equations from (29). Memorize these! However, solving Maxwell’s equations directly is
difficult! We instead use potentials. Let’s start with B = ∇ × A, which is true since ∇ ⋅ B = 0. In that case,
𝜕B 𝜕A 𝜕A
∇×E=− = −∇ × ⇒ ∇ × (E + = 0. (61)
𝜕𝑡 𝜕𝑡 𝜕𝑡 )
When the curl of something is 0, it can be written as a gradient, so there exists a 𝜙 such that,
𝜕A
E+ = −∇𝜙. (62)
𝜕𝑡

8
So, given these potentials, we can write the fields,

B = ∇ × A,
𝜕A (63)
E = −∇𝜙 − .
𝜕𝑡