In physics, kinematics studies the geometrical aspects of motion of physical objects independent of forces that set them in motion. Constrained motion such as linked machine parts are also described as kinematics.
Kinematics is concerned with systems of specification of objects' positions and velocities and mathematical transformations between such systems. These systems may be rectangular like cartesian, Curvilinear coordinates like polar coordinates or other systems. The object trajectories may be specified with respect to other objects which may themselve be in motion relative to a standard reference. Rotating systems may also be used.
Numerous practical problems in kinematics involve constraints, such as mechanical linkages, ropes, or rolling disks.
Overview
Kinematics is a subfield of
physics and
mathematics, developed in classical mechanics, that describes the
motion of points,
Physical object (objects), and systems of bodies (groups of objects) without considering the
that cause them to move.
Kinematics differs from
dynamics (also known as
kinetics) which studies the effect of forces on bodies.
Kinematics, as a field of study, is often referred to as the "geometry of motion" and is occasionally seen as a branch of both applied and pure mathematics since it can be studied without considering the mass of a body or the forces acting upon it.[.] A kinematics problem begins by describing the geometry of the system and declaring the initial conditions of any known values of position, velocity and/or acceleration of points within the system. Then, using arguments from geometry, the position, velocity and acceleration of any unknown parts of the system can be determined.
Another way to describe kinematics is as the specification of the possible states of a physical system. Dynamics then describes the evolution of a system through such states. Robert Spekkens argues that this division cannot be empirically tests and thus has no physical basis.
Kinematics is used in astrophysics to describe the motion of celestial bodies and collections of such bodies. In mechanical engineering, robotics, and biomechanics, kinematics is used to describe the motion of systems composed of joined parts (multi-link systems) such as an engine, a robot kinematics or the human skeleton.
Geometric transformations, including called rigid transformations, are used to describe the movement of components in a mechanical system, simplifying the derivation of the equations of motion. They are also central to dynamic analysis.
Robot kinematics is the process of measuring the kinematic quantities used to describe motion. In engineering, for instance, kinematic analysis may be used to find the range of movement for a given mechanism and, working in reverse, using Burmester theory to design a mechanism for a desired range of motion.[J. M. McCarthy and G. S. Soh, 2010, Geometric Design of Linkages, Springer, New York.] In addition, kinematics applies algebraic geometry to the study of the mechanical advantage of a mechanical system or mechanism.
Relativistic kinematics applies the special theory of relativity to the geometry of object motion. It encompasses time dilation, length contraction and the Lorentz transformation. The kinematics of relativity operates in a spacetime geometry where spatial points are augmented with a time coordinate to form four-vectors.
Werner Heisenberg reinterpreted classical kinetics for quantum systems in his 1925 paper Umdeutung paper.[Heisenberg, Werner. "Quantum-theoretical re-interpretation of kinematic and mechanical relations." Z. Phys 33 (1925): 879-893.] Dirac noted the similarity in structure between Heisenberg's formulations and classical Poisson brackets. In a follow up paper in 1927 Heisenberg showed that classical kinematic notions like velocity and energy are valid in quantum mechanics, but pairs of conjugate kinematic and dynamic quantities cannot be simultaneously measure, a result he called indeterminacy, but which became known as the uncertainty principle.
Etymology
The term kinematic is the English version of A.M. Ampère's
cinématique,
which he constructed from the Greek κίνημα
kinema ("movement, motion"), itself derived from κινεῖν
kinein ("to move").
Kinematic and cinématique are related to the French word cinéma, but neither are directly derived from it. However, they do share a root word in common, as cinéma came from the shortened form of cinématographe, "motion picture projector and camera", once again from the Greek word for movement and from the Greek γρᾰ́φω grapho ("to write").
Kinematics of a particle trajectory in a non-rotating frame of reference
Particle kinematics is the study of the trajectory of particles. The position of a particle is defined as the coordinate vector from the origin of a coordinate frame to the particle. For example, consider a tower 50 m south from your home, where the coordinate frame is centered at your home, such that east is in the direction of the
x-axis and north is in the direction of the
y-axis, then the coordinate vector to the base of the tower is
r = (0 m, −50 m, 0 m). If the tower is 50 m high, and this height is measured along the
z-axis, then the coordinate vector to the top of the tower is
r = (0 m, −50 m, 50 m).
In the most general case, a three-dimensional coordinate system is used to define the position of a particle. However, if the particle is constrained to move within a plane, a two-dimensional coordinate system is sufficient. All observations in physics are incomplete without being described with respect to a reference frame.
The position vector of a particle is a Euclidean vector drawn from the origin of the reference frame to the particle. It expresses both the distance of the point from the origin and its direction from the origin. In three dimensions, the position vector can be expressed as
where , , and are the Cartesian coordinates and , and are the unit vectors along the , , and coordinate axes, respectively. The magnitude of the position vector gives the distance between the point and the origin.
The of the position vector provide a quantitative measure of direction. In general, an object's position vector will depend on the frame of reference; different frames will lead to different values for the position vector.
The trajectory of a particle is a vector function of time, , which defines the curve traced by the moving particle, given by
where , , and describe each coordinate of the particle's position as a function of time.
Velocity and speed
The
velocity of a particle is a vector quantity that describes the
direction as well as the magnitude of motion of the particle. More mathematically, the rate of change of the position vector of a point with respect to time is the velocity of the point. Consider the ratio formed by dividing the difference of two positions of a particle (displacement) by the time interval. This ratio is called the
average velocity over that time interval and is defined as
where
is the displacement vector during the time interval
. In the limit that the time interval
approaches zero, the average velocity approaches the instantaneous velocity, defined as the time derivative of the position vector,
Thus, a particle's velocity is the time rate of change of its position. Furthermore, this velocity is
tangent to the particle's trajectory at every position along its path. In a non-rotating frame of reference, the derivatives of the coordinate directions are not considered as their directions and magnitudes are constants.
The speed of an object is the magnitude of its velocity. It is a scalar quantity:
where is the arc-length measured along the trajectory of the particle. This arc-length must always increase as the particle moves. Hence, is non-negative, which implies that speed is also non-negative.
Acceleration
The velocity vector can change in magnitude and in direction or both at once. Hence, the acceleration accounts for both the rate of change of the magnitude of the velocity vector and the rate of change of direction of that vector. The same reasoning used with respect to the position of a particle to define velocity, can be applied to the velocity to define acceleration. The
acceleration of a particle is the vector defined by the rate of change of the velocity vector. The average acceleration of a particle over a time interval is defined as the ratio.
where Δ
v is the average velocity and Δ
t is the time interval.
The acceleration of the particle is the limit of the average acceleration as the time interval approaches zero, which is the time derivative,
Alternatively,
Thus, acceleration is the first derivative of the velocity vector and the second derivative of the position vector of that particle. In a non-rotating frame of reference, the derivatives of the coordinate directions are not considered as their directions and magnitudes are constants.
The magnitude of the acceleration of an object is the magnitude | a| of its acceleration vector. It is a scalar quantity:
Relative position vector
A relative position vector is a vector that defines the position of one point relative to another. It is the difference in position of the two points.
The position of one point
A relative to another point
B is simply the difference between their positions
which is the difference between the components of their position vectors.
If point A has position components
and point B has position components
then the position of point A relative to point B is the difference between their components:
Relative velocity
The velocity of one point relative to another is simply the difference between their velocities
which is the difference between the components of their velocities.
If point A has velocity components and point B has velocity components then the velocity of point A relative to point B is the difference between their components:
Alternatively, this same result could be obtained by computing the time derivative of the relative position vector rB/A.
Relative acceleration
The acceleration of one point
C relative to another point
B is simply the difference between their accelerations.
which is the difference between the components of their accelerations.
If point C has acceleration components
and point B has acceleration components
then the acceleration of point C relative to point B is the difference between their components:
Assuming that the initial conditions of the position, , and velocity at time are known, the first integration yields the velocity of the particle as a function of time.
Additional relations between displacement, velocity, acceleration, and time can be derived. If the acceleration is constant,
can be substituted into the above equation to give:
A relationship between velocity, position and acceleration without explicit time dependence can be obtained by solving the average acceleration for time and substituting and simplifying
where denotes the dot product, which is appropriate as the products are scalars rather than vectors.
The dot product can be replaced by the cosine of the angle between the vectors (see Geometric interpretation of the dot product for more details) and the vectors by their magnitudes, in which case:
In the case of acceleration always in the direction of the motion and the direction of motion should be in positive or negative, the angle between the vectors () is 0, so , and
This can be simplified using the notation for the magnitudes of the vectors where can be any curvaceous path taken as the constant tangential acceleration is applied along that path, so
This reduces the parametric equations of motion of the particle to a Cartesian relationship of speed versus position. This relation is useful when time is unknown. We also know that