Moment of Inertia Around An Arbitrary Axis
The moment of inertia of a body around an arbitrary axis in space is a scalar that is computed as the sum of the distance squared from the axis to each of the mass elements. This scalar can be computed from the moment inertia matrix of the body using the unit vector along the axis.
Let a rigid assembly of rigid system of N particles, Pi, i = 1,...,N, have coordinates ri. Choose R as a reference point and compute the moment of inertia around an axis L defined by the unit vector S through the reference point R. The moment of inertia of the system around this line L=R+tS is computed by determining the perpendicular vector from this axis to the particle Pi given by
where is the identity matrix and is the outer product matrix formed from the unit vector S along the line L.
Introduce the skew-symmetric matrix such that y=S x y, then we have the identity
which relies on the fact that S is a unit vector.
The magnitude squared of the perpendicular vector is
The simplification of this equation uses the identity
where the dot and the cross products have been interchanged. Expand the cross products to compute
where is the skew symmetric matrix obtained from the vector ri-R.
Thus, the moment of inertia around the line L through R in the direction S is given by the scalar
or
where is the moment of inertia matrix of the system relative to the reference point R.
Read more about this topic: Inertia Tensor
Famous quotes containing the words moment of, moment, inertia, arbitrary and/or axis:
“I believe that in the history of art and of thought there has always been at every living moment of culture a “will to renewal.” This is not the prerogative of the last decade only. All history is nothing but a succession of “crises”Mof rupture, repudiation and resistance.... When there is no “crisis,” there is stagnation, petrification and death. All thought, all art is aggressive.”
—Eugène Ionesco (b. 1912)
“It’s an old trick now, God knows, but it works every time. At the very moment women start to expand their place in the world, scientific studies deliver compelling reasons for them to stay home.”
—Mary Kay Blakely (20th century)
“What is wrong with priests and popes is that instead of being apostles and saints, they are nothing but empirics who say “I know” instead of “I am learning,” and pray for credulity and inertia as wise men pray for scepticism and activity.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“We do the same thing to parents that we do to children. We insist that they are some kind of categorical abstraction because they produced a child. They were people before that, and they’re still people in all other areas of their lives. But when it comes to the state of parenthood they are abruptly heir to a whole collection of virtues and feelings that are assigned to them with a fine arbitrary disregard for individuality.”
—Leontine Young (20th century)
“He is the essence that inquires.
He is the axis of the star;
He is the sparkle of the spar;
He is the heart of every creature;
He is the meaning of each feature;
And his mind is the sky,
Than all it holds more deep, more high.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)