A Brief On Tensor Analysis

In this text which gradually develops the tools for formulating and manipulating the field equations of Continuum Mechanics, the mathematics of tensor analysis is introduced in four, well-separated stages, and the physical interpretation and application of vectors and tensors are stressed throughout. This new edition contains more exercises. In addition, the author has appended a section on Differential Geometry.

When I was an undergraduate, working as a co-op student at North American Aviation, I tried to learn something about tensors. In the Aeronautical En gineering Department at MIT, I had just finished an introductory course in classical mechanics that so impressed me that to this day I cannot watch a plane in flight-especially in a tum-without imaging it bristling with vec tors. Near the end of the course the professor showed that, if an airplane is treated as a rigid body, there arises a mysterious collection of rather simple looking integrals called the components of the moment of inertia tensor. Tensor-what power those two syllables seemed to resonate. I had heard the word once before, in an aside by a graduate instructor to the cognoscenti in the front row of a course in strength of materials. "What the book calls stress is actually a tensor. . . ." With my interest twice piqued and with time off from fighting the brush fires of a demanding curriculum, I was ready for my first serious effort at self instruction. In Los Angeles, after several tries, I found a store with a book on tensor analysis. In my mind I had rehearsed the scene in which a graduate stu dent or professor, spying me there, would shout, "You're an undergraduate.

DIVProceeds from general to special, including chapters on vector analysis on manifolds and integration theory. /div

It is an ideal companion for courses such as mathematical methods of physics, classical mechanics, electricity and magnetism, and relativity.--Gary White, editor of The Physics Teacher "American Journal of Physics"

This textbook is distinguished from other texts on the subject by the depth of the presentation and the discussion of the calculus of moving surfaces, which is an extension of tensor calculus to deforming manifolds. Designed for advanced undergraduate and graduate students, this text invites its audience to take a fresh look at previously learned material through the prism of tensor calculus. Once the framework is mastered, the student is introduced to new material which includes differential geometry on manifolds, shape optimization, boundary perturbation and dynamic fluid film equations. The language of tensors, originally championed by Einstein, is as fundamental as the languages of calculus and linear algebra and is one that every technical scientist ought to speak. The tensor technique, invented at the turn of the 20th century, is now considered classical. Yet, as the author shows, it remains remarkably vital and relevant. The author’s skilled lecturing capabilities are evident by the inclusion of insightful examples and a plethora of exercises. A great deal of material is devoted to the geometric fundamentals, the mechanics of change of variables, the proper use of the tensor notation and the discussion of the interplay between algebra and geometry. The early chapters have many words and few equations. The definition of a tensor comes only in Chapter 6 – when the reader is ready for it. While this text maintains a consistent level of rigor, it takes great care to avoid formalizing the subject. The last part of the textbook is devoted to the Calculus of Moving Surfaces. It is the first textbook exposition of this important technique and is one of the gems of this text. A number of exciting applications of the calculus are presented including shape optimization, boundary perturbation of boundary value problems and dynamic fluid film equations developed by the author in recent years. Furthermore, the moving surfaces framework is used to offer new derivations of classical results such as the geodesic equation and the celebrated Gauss-Bonnet theorem.

The subject of Tensor Analysis deals with the problem of the formulation of the relation between various entities in forms which remain invariant when we pass from one system of coordinates to another. The invariant form of equation is necessarily related to the possible system of coordinates with reference to which the equation remains invariant. The primary purpose of this book is the study of the invariance form of equation relative to the totally of the rectangular co-ordinate system in the three-dimensional Euclidean space. We start with the consideration of the way the sets representing various entities are transformed when we pass from one system of rectangular co-ordinates to another. A Tensor may be a physical entity that can be described as a Tensor only with respect to the manner of its representation by means of multi-sux sets associated with different system of axes such that the sets associated with different system of co-ordinate obey the transformation law for Tensor. We have employed sux notation for tensors of any order, we could also employ single letter such A,B to denote Tensors.