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Calculus of variations is concerned with variations of functionals, which are small changes in the functional's value due to small changes in the function that is its argument. The first variation [ l ] is defined as the linear part of the change in the functional, and the second variation [ m ] is defined as the quadratic part.
In mathematics, specifically in the calculus of variations, a variation δf of a function f can be concentrated on an arbitrarily small interval, but not a single point. . Accordingly, the necessary condition of extremum (functional derivative equal zero) appears in a weak formulation (variational form) integrated with an arbitrary function
In mathematics, the direct method in the calculus of variations is a general method for constructing a proof of the existence of a minimizer for a given functional, [1] introduced by Stanisław Zaremba and David Hilbert around 1900. The method relies on methods of functional analysis and topology. As well as being used to prove the existence of ...
The calculus of variations (or variational calculus) is a field of mathematical analysis that uses variations, which are small changes in functions and functionals, to find maxima
The Weierstrass–Erdmann condition is a mathematical result from the calculus of variations, which specifies sufficient conditions for broken extremals (that is, an extremal which is constrained to be smooth except at a finite number of "corners").
For example, the problem of determining the shape of a hanging chain suspended at both ends—a catenary—can be solved using variational calculus, and in this case, the variational principle is the following: The solution is a function that minimizes the gravitational potential energy of the chain.
The curve has to minimize its potential energy = = + ′, and is subject to the constraint + ′ =, where is the force of gravity. Because the independent variable x {\displaystyle x} does not appear in the integrand, the Beltrami identity may be used to express the path of the string as a separable first order differential equation
In mathematics, variational analysis is the combination and extension of methods from convex optimization and the classical calculus of variations to a more general theory. [1] This includes the more general problems of optimization theory, including topics in set-valued analysis, e.g. generalized derivatives.