Covariant derivativeIn mathematics, the covariant derivative is a way of specifying a derivative along tangent vectors of a manifold. Alternatively, the covariant derivative is a way of introducing and working with a connection on a manifold by means of a differential operator, to be contrasted with the approach given by a principal connection on the frame bundle – see affine connection. In the special case of a manifold isometrically embedded into a higher-dimensional Euclidean space, the covariant derivative can be viewed as the orthogonal projection of the Euclidean directional derivative onto the manifold's tangent space.
Exterior covariant derivativeIn the mathematical field of differential geometry, the exterior covariant derivative is an extension of the notion of exterior derivative to the setting of a differentiable principal bundle or vector bundle with a connection. Let G be a Lie group and P → M be a principal G-bundle on a smooth manifold M. Suppose there is a connection on P; this yields a natural direct sum decomposition of each tangent space into the horizontal and vertical subspaces. Let be the projection to the horizontal subspace.
Differential formIn mathematics, differential forms provide a unified approach to define integrands over curves, surfaces, solids, and higher-dimensional manifolds. The modern notion of differential forms was pioneered by Élie Cartan. It has many applications, especially in geometry, topology and physics. For instance, the expression f(x) dx is an example of a 1-form, and can be integrated over an interval [a, b] contained in the domain of f: Similarly, the expression f(x, y, z) dx ∧ dy + g(x, y, z) dz ∧ dx + h(x, y, z) dy ∧ dz is a 2-form that can be integrated over a surface S: The symbol ∧ denotes the exterior product, sometimes called the wedge product, of two differential forms.
Differential geometryDifferential geometry is a mathematical discipline that studies the geometry of smooth shapes and smooth spaces, otherwise known as smooth manifolds. It uses the techniques of differential calculus, integral calculus, linear algebra and multilinear algebra. The field has its origins in the study of spherical geometry as far back as antiquity. It also relates to astronomy, the geodesy of the Earth, and later the study of hyperbolic geometry by Lobachevsky.
Lie derivativeIn differential geometry, the Lie derivative (liː ), named after Sophus Lie by Władysław Ślebodziński, evaluates the change of a tensor field (including scalar functions, vector fields and one-forms), along the flow defined by another vector field. This change is coordinate invariant and therefore the Lie derivative is defined on any differentiable manifold. Functions, tensor fields and forms can be differentiated with respect to a vector field. If T is a tensor field and X is a vector field, then the Lie derivative of T with respect to X is denoted .
Levi-Civita connectionIn Riemannian or pseudo-Riemannian geometry (in particular the Lorentzian geometry of general relativity), the Levi-Civita connection is the unique affine connection on the tangent bundle of a manifold (i.e. affine connection) that preserves the (pseudo-)Riemannian metric and is torsion-free. The fundamental theorem of Riemannian geometry states that there is a unique connection which satisfies these properties. In the theory of Riemannian and pseudo-Riemannian manifolds the term covariant derivative is often used for the Levi-Civita connection.
Hodge theoryIn mathematics, Hodge theory, named after W. V. D. Hodge, is a method for studying the cohomology groups of a smooth manifold M using partial differential equations. The key observation is that, given a Riemannian metric on M, every cohomology class has a canonical representative, a differential form that vanishes under the Laplacian operator of the metric. Such forms are called harmonic. The theory was developed by Hodge in the 1930s to study algebraic geometry, and it built on the work of Georges de Rham on de Rham cohomology.
Riemannian geometryRiemannian geometry is the branch of differential geometry that studies Riemannian manifolds, defined as smooth manifolds with a Riemannian metric (an inner product on the tangent space at each point that varies smoothly from point to point). This gives, in particular, local notions of angle, length of curves, surface area and volume. From those, some other global quantities can be derived by integrating local contributions.
Directional derivativeA directional derivative is a concept in multivariable calculus that measures the rate at which a function changes in a particular direction at a given point. The directional derivative of a multivariable differentiable (scalar) function along a given vector v at a given point x intuitively represents the instantaneous rate of change of the function, moving through x with a velocity specified by v. The directional derivative of a scalar function f with respect to a vector v at a point (e.g.
Tangent spaceIn mathematics, the tangent space of a manifold is a generalization of to curves in two-dimensional space and to surfaces in three-dimensional space in higher dimensions. In the context of physics the tangent space to a manifold at a point can be viewed as the space of possible velocities for a particle moving on the manifold. In differential geometry, one can attach to every point of a differentiable manifold a tangent space—a real vector space that intuitively contains the possible directions in which one can tangentially pass through .
Vector-valued differential formIn mathematics, a vector-valued differential form on a manifold M is a differential form on M with values in a vector space V. More generally, it is a differential form with values in some vector bundle E over M. Ordinary differential forms can be viewed as R-valued differential forms. An important case of vector-valued differential forms are Lie algebra-valued forms. (A connection form is an example of such a form.) Let M be a smooth manifold and E → M be a smooth vector bundle over M.
Tullio Levi-CivitaTullio Levi-Civita, (ˈtʊlioʊ_ˈlɛvi_ˈtʃɪvᵻtə, ˈtulljo ˈlɛːvi ˈtʃiːvita; 29 March 1873 – 29 December 1941) was an Italian mathematician, most famous for his work on absolute differential calculus (tensor calculus) and its applications to the theory of relativity, but who also made significant contributions in other areas. He was a pupil of Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro, the inventor of tensor calculus.
Differential geometry of surfacesIn mathematics, the differential geometry of surfaces deals with the differential geometry of smooth surfaces with various additional structures, most often, a Riemannian metric. Surfaces have been extensively studied from various perspectives: extrinsically, relating to their embedding in Euclidean space and intrinsically, reflecting their properties determined solely by the distance within the surface as measured along curves on the surface.
Closed and exact differential formsIn mathematics, especially vector calculus and differential topology, a closed form is a differential form α whose exterior derivative is zero (dα = 0), and an exact form is a differential form, α, that is the exterior derivative of another differential form β. Thus, an exact form is in the of d, and a closed form is in the kernel of d. For an exact form α, α = dβ for some differential form β of degree one less than that of α. The form β is called a "potential form" or "primitive" for α.
Tangent bundleIn differential geometry, the tangent bundle of a differentiable manifold is a manifold which assembles all the tangent vectors in . As a set, it is given by the disjoint union of the tangent spaces of . That is, where denotes the tangent space to at the point . So, an element of can be thought of as a pair , where is a point in and is a tangent vector to at . There is a natural projection defined by . This projection maps each element of the tangent space to the single point .
Contorsion tensorThe contorsion tensor in differential geometry is the difference between a connection with and without torsion in it. It commonly appears in the study of spin connections. Thus, for example, a vielbein together with a spin connection, when subject to the condition of vanishing torsion, gives a description of Einstein gravity. For supersymmetry, the same constraint, of vanishing torsion, gives (the field equations of) 11-dimensional supergravity.
Serre dualityIn algebraic geometry, a branch of mathematics, Serre duality is a duality for the coherent sheaf cohomology of algebraic varieties, proved by Jean-Pierre Serre. The basic version applies to vector bundles on a smooth projective variety, but Alexander Grothendieck found wide generalizations, for example to singular varieties. On an n-dimensional variety, the theorem says that a cohomology group is the dual space of another one, . Serre duality is the analog for coherent sheaf cohomology of Poincaré duality in topology, with the canonical line bundle replacing the orientation sheaf.
Riemann curvature tensorIn the mathematical field of differential geometry, the Riemann curvature tensor or Riemann–Christoffel tensor (after Bernhard Riemann and Elwin Bruno Christoffel) is the most common way used to express the curvature of Riemannian manifolds. It assigns a tensor to each point of a Riemannian manifold (i.e., it is a tensor field). It is a local invariant of Riemannian metrics which measures the failure of the second covariant derivatives to commute. A Riemannian manifold has zero curvature if and only if it is flat, i.
Generalizations of the derivativeIn mathematics, the derivative is a fundamental construction of differential calculus and admits many possible generalizations within the fields of mathematical analysis, combinatorics, algebra, geometry, etc. The Fréchet derivative defines the derivative for general normed vector spaces . Briefly, a function , an open subset of , is called Fréchet differentiable at if there exists a bounded linear operator such that Functions are defined as being differentiable in some open neighbourhood of , rather than at individual points, as not doing so tends to lead to many pathological counterexamples.
One-form (differential geometry)In differential geometry, a one-form on a differentiable manifold is a smooth section of the cotangent bundle. Equivalently, a one-form on a manifold is a smooth mapping of the total space of the tangent bundle of to whose restriction to each fibre is a linear functional on the tangent space. Symbolically, where is linear. Often one-forms are described locally, particularly in local coordinates. In a local coordinate system, a one-form is a linear combination of the differentials of the coordinates: where the are smooth functions.
