In mathematics, an integral curve is a parametric curve that represents a specific solution to an ordinary differential equation or system of equations. If the differential equation is represented as a vector field or slope field, then the corresponding integral curves are tangent to the field at each point.
Integral curves are known by various other names, depending on the nature and interpretation of the differential equation or vector field. In physics, integral curves for an electric field or magnetic field are known as field lines, and integral curves for the velocity field of a fluid are known as flow lines. In dynamical systems, the integral curves for a differential equation that governs a system are referred to as trajectories or orbits.
The name “integral curve” derives from an obsolete meaning for the word “integral”. Historically, the operation of solving a differential equation was known as “integrating” the equation, and the solutions were known as “integrals”.
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Famous quotes containing the words integral and/or curve:
“Make the most of your regrets; never smother your sorrow, but tend and cherish it till it come to have a separate and integral interest. To regret deeply is to live afresh.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“I have been photographing our toilet, that glossy enameled receptacle of extraordinary beauty.... Here was every sensuous curve of the “human figure divine” but minus the imperfections. Never did the Greeks reach a more significant consummation to their culture, and it somehow reminded me, in the glory of its chaste convulsions and in its swelling, sweeping, forward movement of finely progressing contours, of the Victory of Samothrace.”
—Edward Weston (1886–1958)