Consider the vector field F(x,y)=⟨y,5⟩, and let C be the curve of the ellipse having equation frac{x^{2}}{4}+frac{y^{2}}{9}=1.

SchachtN

SchachtN

Answered question

2021-02-08

Consider the vector field F(x,y)=y,5, and let C be the curve of the ellipse having equation x24+y29=1. Compute the line integral CF dr, where r(t) is a parametrization of C going once around counterclockwise.

Answer & Explanation

sovienesY

sovienesY

Skilled2021-02-09Added 89 answers

The first thing we need to do is come up with a parametrization of the ellipse. In general, you can parameterize the equation
x2a2+y2b2=1
by 

x=±acos(ωt+θ0)x=±acos(ωt+θ0)

y=±bsin(ωt+θ0)y=±bsin(ωt+θ0)

for any angle θ and angular frequency ω. We can see this is the case by simply substituting these expressions into the above equation and confirming that it works out. The choice of the sign and phase angles just comes down to which direction you want to go around the ellipse and where you'd like to start on the ellipse. And the choice of ω just determines how "fast" you want to go around the ellipse. The speed doesn't matter at all for us so let's choose ω=1 so it basically disappears. The sign should be positive if we want to go around counterclockwise. And it really doesn't matter where we start on the ellipse as we just need to make one full trip around so we might as well set θ0=0 as well.
Hence our parametrization becomes x=2cos(t), y=3sin(t). Please confirm a few things about this before moving on: (1) this is a parametrization of the ellipse given by the equation in the question, (2) it goes in the correct direction, and (3) this parametrization is periodic in 2π and hence we can take our integral over t=0 to t=2π.
With that all set, we almost ready to substitute in and evaluate this integral. The remaining piece is that we need to differentiate this parametrization vector r(t)=2cos(t),3sin(t)r(t)=. So here we go.
drdt=ddt[2cos(t),3sin(t)]=[2sin(t),3cos(t)]
There we go. Now we're set to work on this integral. Don't forget that drdr is basically just shorthand for (dr/dt)dt and hence
cFdr=t0t1Fr(t)×drt=02π{3sin(t),5}×{2sin(t),3cos(t)}dt=02π6sin2(t)+15cos(t)dt=6π
Let me know if you need help with the integration. It should be straightforward, just remember to do a power reduction on the sin2term.

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