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The Road to Reality Study Notes: Difference between revisions
→7.2 Contour integration
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Continuous deformation in this sense is defined as [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homology_(mathematics)#:~:text=When%20two%20cycles%20can%20be,in%20the%20same%20homology%20class. homologous deformation], where parts of the path can cancel each other out if they are traversed in opposite directions. This contrasts with homotopic paths where you may not cancel parts. As a visualization we take the function of 1/z with a homologous path: | Continuous deformation in this sense is defined as [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homology_(mathematics)#:~:text=When%20two%20cycles%20can%20be,in%20the%20same%20homology%20class. homologous deformation], where parts of the path can cancel each other out if they are traversed in opposite directions. This contrasts with homotopic paths where you may not cancel parts. As a visualization we take the function of 1/z with a homologous path: | ||
The amazing result here is that a general contour from $$a$$ to $$b$$ for the function <math>\frac{1}{z}</math> has be rephrased and shown to be equal to the result for a ''closed contour'' that loops around the point of non-analyticity (the origin in this case), regardless of where the points $$a$$ and $$b$$ (or the point of non-analyticity) lie in the complex plane. Note that since | |||
The amazing result here is that a general contour from $$a$$ to $$b$$ for the function <math>\frac{1}{z}</math> has be rephrased and shown to be equal to the result for a ''closed contour'' that loops around the point of non-analyticity (the origin in this case), regardless of where the points $$a$$ and $$b$$ (or the point of non-analyticity) lie in the complex plane. Note that since $$logz$$ is multi-valued, we need to specify the actual closed contour being used (if we looped twice rather than once, then the answer is different). | |||
== Chapter 8 Riemann surfaces and complex mappings == | == Chapter 8 Riemann surfaces and complex mappings == | ||