PX275 - D3a - green's theorem in the plane

- green's theorem relates an integral around a closed loop to an integral over the area of the region enclosed by the loop
- this is a two dimensional theorem, but it underpins the divergence and stokes' theorems
- considering a vector field in 2D:
where,
- taking a path from
to in the plane:
- considering a closed loop:

- green's theorem relates the integral of a vector field around a loop to the integral of the differentiated components of that field over the area enclosed by the loop:
- for a conservative field, the loop integral will be zero, and hence, so is the
of green's theorem:
- extending it to three dimensions gives stokes' theorem:
where,