Toward the Landau–Lifshitz version of the Thomson electrostatics theorem

Abstract

In the classical textbook (Landau and Lifshitz, 1963), Landau and Lifshtz suggested their version of the famous Thomson variational principle (a.k.a Thomson theorem.) So far, their version has not gained the interest it deserves, either among physicists or among applied mathematicians. Partially, the lack of interest can be explained because of the quality of the suggested proof of the principle. It is considerably lower than the standards accepted in classical electrostatics and mathematical physics. Even more importantly, Landau and Lifshitz did not demostrate the minimum property of the electrostatic energy at equilibrium. In this note, we, first, modify and specify the Landau–Lifshitz formulation of the principle presenting it as the isoperimetric variational problem. Then, for this isoperimetric problem we calculate the first and second variations, and we prove that the first variation vanishes, whereas the second variation appears to be positive.

Keywords

• Electrostatics
• Variational principles
• The Thomson theorem (principle)