The Mathematics of Soap Films

The Mathematics of Soap Films PDF Author: John Oprea
Publisher: American Mathematical Soc.
ISBN: 9780821884461
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 284

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Book Description
Nature tries to minimize the surface area of a soap film through the action of surface tension. The process can be understood mathematically by using differential geometry, complex analysis, and the calculus of variations. This book employs ingredients from each of these subjects to tell the mathematical story of soap films. The text is fully self-contained, bringing together a mixture of types of mathematics along with a bit of the physics that underlies the subject. The development is primarily from first principles, requiring no advanced background material from either mathematics or physics. Through the Maple applications, the reader is given tools for creating the shapes that are being studied. Thus, you can "see" a fluid rising up an inclined plane, create minimal surfaces from complex variables data, and investigate the "true" shape of a balloon. Oprea also includes descriptions of experiments and photographs that let you see real soap films on wire frames. The theory of minimal surfaces is a beautiful subject, which naturally introduces the reader to fascinating, yet accessible, topics in mathematics. Oprea's presentation is rich with examples, explanations, and applications. It would make an excellent text for a senior seminar or for independent study by upper-division mathematics or science majors.

The Mathematics of Soap Films

The Mathematics of Soap Films PDF Author: John Oprea
Publisher: American Mathematical Soc.
ISBN: 9780821884461
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 284

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Book Description
Nature tries to minimize the surface area of a soap film through the action of surface tension. The process can be understood mathematically by using differential geometry, complex analysis, and the calculus of variations. This book employs ingredients from each of these subjects to tell the mathematical story of soap films. The text is fully self-contained, bringing together a mixture of types of mathematics along with a bit of the physics that underlies the subject. The development is primarily from first principles, requiring no advanced background material from either mathematics or physics. Through the Maple applications, the reader is given tools for creating the shapes that are being studied. Thus, you can "see" a fluid rising up an inclined plane, create minimal surfaces from complex variables data, and investigate the "true" shape of a balloon. Oprea also includes descriptions of experiments and photographs that let you see real soap films on wire frames. The theory of minimal surfaces is a beautiful subject, which naturally introduces the reader to fascinating, yet accessible, topics in mathematics. Oprea's presentation is rich with examples, explanations, and applications. It would make an excellent text for a senior seminar or for independent study by upper-division mathematics or science majors.

The Mathematics of Soap Films: Explorations with Maple

The Mathematics of Soap Films: Explorations with Maple PDF Author: John Oprea
Publisher: American Mathematical Soc.
ISBN: 0821821180
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 282

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Book Description
Nature tries to minimize the surface area of a soap film through the action of surface tension. The process can be understood mathematically by using differential geometry, complex analysis, and the calculus of variations. This book employs ingredients from each of these subjects to tell the mathematical story of soap films. The text is fully self-contained, bringing together a mixture of types of mathematics along with a bit of the physics that underlies the subject. The development is primarily from first principles, requiring no advanced background material from either mathematics or physics. Through the Maple applications, the reader is given tools for creating the shapes that are being studied. Thus, you can "see" a fluid rising up an inclined plane, create minimal surfaces from complex variables data, and investigate the "true" shape of a balloon. Oprea also includes descriptions of experiments and photographs that let you see real soap films on wire frames. The theory of minimal surfaces is a beautiful subject, which naturally introduces the reader to fascinating, yet accessible, topics in mathematics. Oprea's presentation is rich with examples, explanations, and applications. It would make an excellent text for a senior seminar or for independent study by upper-division mathematics or science majors.

Demonstrating Science with Soap Films

Demonstrating Science with Soap Films PDF Author: Lovett
Publisher: CRC Press
ISBN: 9780367402136
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 216

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Book Description
Many of us have been fascinated as children by soap bubbles and soap films. Their shapes and colours are beautiful and they are great fun to pay with. With no les intensity, scientists and mathematicians have been interested in the properties of bubbles and films throughout scientific history. In this book David Lovett describes the properties of soap films and soap bubbles. He then uses their properties to illustrate and elucidate a wide range of physical principles and scientific phenomena in a way that unifies different concepts. The book will appeal not only to students and teachers at school and university but also to readers with a general scientific interest and to researchers studying soap films. For the most part simple school mathematics is used. Sections containing more advanced mathematics have been placed in boxes or appendices and can be omitted by readers without the appropriate mathematical background. The text is supported with * Over 100 diagrams and photgraphs. * Details of practical experiments that can be performed using simple household materials. * Computer programs that draw some of the more complicated figures or animate sequences of soap film configurations. * A bibliography for readers wishing to delve further into the subject. David Lovett is a lecturer in physics at the University of Essex. His research interests include Langmiur-Blodgett thin films and the use of models as teaching aids in physics. He has been interested in soap films since 1978 and has made a number of original contributions to the subject, particularly in the use of models which change their dimensions and their analogy with phase transitions. He has published three other books including ITensor Properties of Crystals (Institute of Physics Publishing 1989). John Tilley is also a lecturer in physics at the University of Essex with research interests in theoretical solid-state physics and soap films. He is coauthor of Superfluidity and Superconductivity (Institute of Physics Publishing, 3rd edition, 1990).

Geometric Measure Theory

Geometric Measure Theory PDF Author: Frank Morgan
Publisher: Elsevier
ISBN: 1483277801
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 154

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Book Description
Geometric Measure Theory: A Beginner's Guide provides information pertinent to the development of geometric measure theory. This book presents a few fundamental arguments and a superficial discussion of the regularity theory. Organized into 12 chapters, this book begins with an overview of the purpose and fundamental concepts of geometric measure theory. This text then provides the measure-theoretic foundation, including the definition of Hausdorff measure and covering theory. Other chapters consider the m-dimensional surfaces of geometric measure theory called rectifiable sets and introduce the two basic tools of the regularity theory of area-minimizing surfaces. This book discusses as well the fundamental theorem of geometric measure theory, which guarantees solutions to a wide class of variational problems in general dimensions. The final chapter deals with the basic methods of geometry and analysis in a generality that embraces manifold applications. This book is a valuable resource for graduate students, mathematicians, and research workers.

Visualizing Mathematics with 3D Printing

Visualizing Mathematics with 3D Printing PDF Author: Henry Segerman
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 1421420368
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 201

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Book Description
The first book to explain mathematics using 3D printed models. Winner of the Technical Text of the Washington Publishers Wouldn’t it be great to experience three-dimensional ideas in three dimensions? In this book—the first of its kind—mathematician and mathematical artist Henry Segerman takes readers on a fascinating tour of two-, three-, and four-dimensional mathematics, exploring Euclidean and non-Euclidean geometries, symmetry, knots, tilings, and soap films. Visualizing Mathematics with 3D Printing includes more than 100 color photographs of 3D printed models. Readers can take the book’s insights to a new level by visiting its sister website, 3dprintmath.com, which features virtual three-dimensional versions of the models for readers to explore. These models can also be ordered online or downloaded to print on a 3D printer. Combining the strengths of book and website, this volume pulls higher geometry and topology out of the realm of the abstract and puts it into the hands of anyone fascinated by mathematical relationships of shape. With the book in one hand and a 3D printed model in the other, readers can find deeper meaning while holding a hyperbolic honeycomb, touching the twists of a torus knot, or caressing the curves of a Klein quartic.

The Science of Soap Films and Soap Bubbles

The Science of Soap Films and Soap Bubbles PDF Author: Cyril Isenberg
Publisher: Courier Dover Publications
ISBN: 9780486269603
Category : Games & Activities
Languages : en
Pages : 244

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Book Description
Superb treatment of molecular and macroscopic properties of soap films and bubbles, emphasizing solutions of physical problems. Over 120 black-and-white illustrations, 41 color photographs.

Minimal Surfaces and Functions of Bounded Variation

Minimal Surfaces and Functions of Bounded Variation PDF Author: Giusti
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1468494864
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 250

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Book Description
The problem of finding minimal surfaces, i. e. of finding the surface of least area among those bounded by a given curve, was one of the first considered after the foundation of the calculus of variations, and is one which received a satis factory solution only in recent years. Called the problem of Plateau, after the blind physicist who did beautiful experiments with soap films and bubbles, it has resisted the efforts of many mathematicians for more than a century. It was only in the thirties that a solution was given to the problem of Plateau in 3-dimensional Euclidean space, with the papers of Douglas [DJ] and Rado [R T1, 2]. The methods of Douglas and Rado were developed and extended in 3-dimensions by several authors, but none of the results was shown to hold even for minimal hypersurfaces in higher dimension, let alone surfaces of higher dimension and codimension. It was not until thirty years later that the problem of Plateau was successfully attacked in its full generality, by several authors using measure-theoretic methods; in particular see De Giorgi [DG1, 2, 4, 5], Reifenberg [RE], Federer and Fleming [FF] and Almgren [AF1, 2]. Federer and Fleming defined a k-dimensional surface in IR" as a k-current, i. e. a continuous linear functional on k-forms. Their method is treated in full detail in the splendid book of Federer [FH 1].

Soap Bubbles, Their Colours and the Forces which Mold Them

Soap Bubbles, Their Colours and the Forces which Mold Them PDF Author: Charles Vernon Boys
Publisher: Courier Corporation
ISBN: 0486205428
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 193

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Book Description
This excellent primer and classic work on the topic of soap bubbles and films employs simple experiments to establish a practical basis for the existence and function of surface tension and energy minimization. Experiments require only soap, straws, and bits of rubber to impart profound fundamental concepts related to fluids. 83 illustrations. 1911 edition.

The Mathematical Mechanic

The Mathematical Mechanic PDF Author: Mark Levi
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 1400830478
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 197

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Book Description
Everybody knows that mathematics is indispensable to physics--imagine where we'd be today if Einstein and Newton didn't have the math to back up their ideas. But how many people realize that physics can be used to produce many astonishing and strikingly elegant solutions in mathematics? Mark Levi shows how in this delightful book, treating readers to a host of entertaining problems and mind-bending puzzlers that will amuse and inspire their inner physicist. Levi turns math and physics upside down, revealing how physics can simplify proofs and lead to quicker solutions and new theorems, and how physical solutions can illustrate why results are true in ways lengthy mathematical calculations never can. Did you know it's possible to derive the Pythagorean theorem by spinning a fish tank filled with water? Or that soap film holds the key to determining the cheapest container for a given volume? Or that the line of best fit for a data set can be found using a mechanical contraption made from a rod and springs? Levi demonstrates how to use physical intuition to solve these and other fascinating math problems. More than half the problems can be tackled by anyone with precalculus and basic geometry, while the more challenging problems require some calculus. This one-of-a-kind book explains physics and math concepts where needed, and includes an informative appendix of physical principles. The Mathematical Mechanic will appeal to anyone interested in the little-known connections between mathematics and physics and how both endeavors relate to the world around us.

Plateau's Problem

Plateau's Problem PDF Author: Frederick J. Almgren (Jr.)
Publisher: American Mathematical Soc.
ISBN: 0821827472
Category : Mathematics
Languages : en
Pages : 96

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Book Description
There have been many wonderful developments in the theory of minimal surfaces and geometric measure theory in the past 25 to 30 years. Many of the researchers who have produced these excellent results were inspired by this little book - or by Fred Almgren himself. The book is indeed a delightful invitation to the world of variational geometry. A central topic is Plateau's Problem, which is concerned with surfaces that model the behavior of soap films.When trying to resolve the problem, however, one soon finds that smooth surfaces are insufficient: Varifolds are needed. With varifolds, one can obtain geometrically meaningful solutions without having to know in advance all their possible singularities. This new tool makes possible much exciting new analysis and many new results. Plateau's problem and varifolds live in the world of geometric measure theory, where differential geometry and measure theory combine to solve problems which have variational aspects. The author's hope in writing this book was to encourage young mathematicians to study this fascinating subject further. Judging from the success of his students, it achieves this exceedingly well.