Lecture 16
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Previous lectures were about
Hamiltonian, Construction of Hamiltonian, Hamilton’s
Equations, Some applications of Hamiltonian and
Hamilton’s Equations of Motion
Lagrange Brackets
Lagrange brackets are certain expressions that were
introduced by Joseph Louis Lagrange in 1808–1810 for the
purposes of mathematical formulation of classical
mechanics, but unlike the Poisson brackets, have fallen out
of use.
Suppose that is a system of canonical coordinates on
a phase space. If each of them is expressed as a function of
two variables, u and v, then the Lagrange bracket
of u and v is defined by the formula
Properties:
Lagrange brackets do not depend on the system
of canonical coordinates . If is another system of
canonical coordinates, so that is a canonical
transformation, then the Lagrange bracket is an invariant
of the transformation, in the sense that
Therefore, the subscripts indicating the canonical
coordinates are often omitted
The coordinates on a phase space are canonical if and
only if the Lagrange brackets between them have the
form
Poisson Brackets
In mathematics and classical mechanics, the Poisson
bracket is an important binary operation in Hamiltonian
mechanics, playing a central role in Hamilton's equations of
motion, which govern the time-evolution of a
Hamiltonian dynamical system. The Poisson bracket also
distinguishes a certain class of coordinate-transformations,
called canonical transformations, which maps canonical
coordinate systems into canonical coordinate systems. (A
"canonical coordinate system" consists of canonical position
and momentum variables that satisfy canonical Poisson-
bracket relations).
From Hamilton's equations we can easily calculate the
rate of change of any function :
In canonical coordinates on the phase space, given two
functions and , the Poisson bracket takes the form
Properties:
In particular
This is called the Jacobi’s Identity.
The Hamilton's equations of motion have an equivalent
expression in terms of the Poisson bracket. This may be
most directly demonstrated in an explicit coordinate
frame. Suppose that is a function in space, then from
the multivariable chain rule, one has
Further, one may take p = p(t) and q = q(t) to be
solutions to Hamilton's equations; that is,
The End
