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10 votes
1 answer
401 views

Rigorous treatment of Ostrogradsky's instability theorem?

The Ostrogradsky instability theorem says that if a Lagrangian depends on more than the position and velocity, the corresponding Hamiltonian is unbounded below. This has been suggested as a reason why ...
user479223's user avatar
  • 1,934
7 votes
2 answers
2k views

Practical example of Hamiltonian reduction

I know what is the Liouville integrability: given a Hamiltonian with $n$ degrees of freedom, with $n$ independent constants of motion in involution, the Hamiltonian can be brought to the form $H(p_1, \...
Doriano Brogioli's user avatar
27 votes
4 answers
13k views

Hamiltonian, Lagrangian and Newton formalism of mechanics

If my thinking is wrong please let me know. I have little knowledge on beyond-college physics. For research purposes, I read a few introductions to these three formalisms of classical mechanics [1,2,...
Henry.L's user avatar
  • 8,071
3 votes
0 answers
194 views

Rigid-body in a central field: orbital and attitude motion

Question I would like to find a nice set of explicit coordinates for the family (parametrised by angular momentum) of reduced systems representing a rigid-body in a central field in which the orbital ...
Dayal C Strub's user avatar
6 votes
1 answer
1k views

How the Jacobi metrics may be useful in mechanics with or without constraints?

A mechanical system $(Q,K,V)$ is specified by the configuration space $Q,$ the potential energy $V\in C^\infty(Q),$ and the kinetic energy $K=K_g$ given by a Riemannian metric $g$ on $Q.$ If $V{<}...
agt's user avatar
  • 4,306
5 votes
1 answer
628 views

What are the canonical and earliest references to trivial symmetries in gauge systems?

I am trying to find canonical references and the history of trivial symmetries. The earliest text book reference I can find is on page 69 of Quantization of Gauge Systems by Henneaux and Teitelboim. ...
Simon's user avatar
  • 461
17 votes
5 answers
2k views

2- and 3-body problems when gravity is not inverse-square

Suppose that gravity did not follow an inverse-square law, but was instead a central force diminishing as $1/d^p$ for distance separation $d$ and some power $p$. Two questions: Presumably the 2-body ...
Joseph O'Rourke's user avatar