Curl (mathematics) - Generalizations

Generalizations

The vector calculus operations of grad, curl, and div are most easily generalized and understood in the context of differential forms, which involves a number of steps. In a nutshell, they correspond to the derivatives of 0-forms, 1-forms, and 2-forms, respectively. The geometric interpretation of curl as rotation corresponds to identifying bivectors (2-vectors) in 3 dimensions with the special orthogonal Lie algebra so(3) of infinitesimal rotations (in coordinates, skew-symmetric 3 × 3 matrices), while representing rotations by vectors corresponds to identifying 1-vectors (equivalently, 2-vectors) and so(3), these all being 3-dimensional spaces.