- Jacobi field
In
Riemannian geometry , a Jacobi field is avector field along ageodesic gamma in aRiemannian manifold describing the difference between the geodesic and an "infinitesimally close" geodesic. In other words, the Jacobi fields along a geodesic form the tangent space to the geodesic in the space of all geodesics. They are named after Carl Jacobi.Definitions and properties
Jacobi fields can be obtained in the following way: Take a smooth one parameter family of geodesics gamma_ au with gamma_0=gamma, then :J(t)=frac{partialgamma_ au(t)}{partial au}|_{ au=0}is a Jacobi field, and describes the behavior of the geodesics in an infinitesimal neighborhood of a given geodesic gamma.
A vector field "J" along a geodesic gamma is said to be a Jacobi field if it satisfies the Jacobi equation::frac{D^2}{dt^2}J(t)+R(J(t),dotgamma(t))dotgamma(t)=0,where "D" denotes the
covariant derivative with respect to theLevi-Civita connection , "R" theRiemann curvature tensor , and dotgamma(t)=dgamma(t)/dt and "t" is the parameter of the geodesic.On a complete Riemannian manifold, for any Jacobi field there is a family of geodesics gamma_ au describing the field (as in the preceding paragraph).The Jacobi equation is a linear, second order ordinary
differential equation ;in particular, values of J and frac{D}{dt}J at one point of gamma uniquely determine the Jacobi field. Furthermore, the set of Jacobi fields along a given geodesic forms a realvector space of dimension twice the dimension of the manifold.As trivial examples of Jacobi fields one can consider dotgamma(t) and tdotgamma(t). These correspond respectively to the following families of reparametrisations: gamma_ au(t)=gamma( au+t) and gamma_ au(t)=gamma((1+ au)t).
Any Jacobi field J can be represented in a unique way as a sum T+I, where T=adotgamma(t)+btdotgamma(t) is a linear combination of trivial Jacobi fields and I(t) is orthogonal to dotgamma(t), for all t. The field I then corresponds to the same variation of geodesics as J, only with changed parameterizations.
Motivating example
On a
sphere , thegeodesic s through the North pole aregreat circle s. Consider two such geodesics gamma_0 and gamma_ au with natural parameter, tin [0,pi] , separated by an angle au. The geodesic distance d(gamma_0(t),gamma_ au(t)) is :d(gamma_0(t),gamma_ au(t))=sin^{-1}igg(sin tsin ausqrt{1+cos^2 t an^2( au/2)}igg). Computing this requires knowing the geodesics. The most interesting information is just that:d(gamma_0(pi),gamma_ au(pi))=0, for any au. Instead, we can consider thederivative with respect to au at au=0::frac{partial}{partial au}igg|_{ au=0}d(gamma_0(t),gamma_ au(t))=|J(t)|=sin t. Notice that we still detect the intersection of the geodesics at t=pi. Notice further that to calculate this derivative we do not actually need to know d(gamma_0(t),gamma_ au(t)), rather, all we need do is solve the equation y"+y=0, for some given initial data.Jacobi fields give a natural generalization of this phenomenon to arbitrary
Riemannian manifold s.olving the Jacobi equation
Let e_1(0)=dotgamma(0)/|dotgamma(0)| and complete this to get an
orthonormal basis ig{e_i(0)ig} at T_{gamma(0)}M.Parallel transport it to get a basis e_i(t)} all along gamma. This gives an orthonormal basis with e_1(t)=dotgamma(t)/|dotgamma(t)|. The Jacobi field can be written in co-ordinates in terms of this basis as J(t)=y^k(t)e_k(t) and thus:frac{D}{dt}J=sum_kfrac{dy^k}{dt}e_k(t),quadfrac{D^2}{dt^2}J=sum_kfrac{d^2y^k}{dt^2}e_k(t), and the Jacobi equation can be rewritten as a system:frac{d^2y^k}{dt^2}+|dotgamma|^2sum_j y^j(t)langle R(e_j(t),e_1(t))e_1(t),e_k(t) angle=0 for each k. This way we get a linear ordinary differential equation (ODE). Since this ODE has smoothcoefficient s we have that solutions exist for all t and are unique, given y^k(0) and y^k}'(0), for all k.Examples
Consider a geodesic gamma(t) with parallel orthonormal frame e_i(t), e_1(t)=dotgamma(t)/|dotgamma|, constructed as above.
* The vector fields along gamma given by dot gamma(t) and tdot gamma(t) are Jacobi fields.
* In Euclidean space (as well as for spaces of constant zero curvature) Jacobi fields are simply those fields linear in t.
*For Riemannian manifolds of constant negative curvature k^2, any Jacobi field is a linear combination of dotgamma(t), tdotgamma(t) and exp(pm kt)e_i(t), where i>1.
*For Riemannian manifolds of constant positive curvature k^2, any Jacobi field is a linear combination of dotgamma(t), tdotgamma(t), sin(kt)e_i(t) and cos(kt)e_i(t), where i>1.
*The restriction of aKilling vector field to a geodesic is a Jacobi field in any Riemannian manifold.ee also
*
conjugate points
*N-Jacobi field References
[do Carmo] M. P. do Carmo, "Riemannian Geometry", Universitext, 1992.
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