A solid non-uniform spherical ball has a radius of and is centered on the origin. Its volume-mass-density is:
There is a particle of mass at position . There is a torque on the ball with respect to the origin, as a result of the gravitational force from the particle.
Determine the absolute value of this torque.
Note: Universal gravitational constant
This section requires Javascript.
You are seeing this because something didn't load right. We suggest you, (a) try
refreshing the page, (b) enabling javascript if it is disabled on your browser and,
finally, (c)
loading the
non-javascript version of this page
. We're sorry about the hassle.
Laying out steps of evaluation. Location of point mass:
r c = ( 1 , 2 , 1 )
Location of any point on the sphere in spherical coordinates:
r p = ( r sin θ cos ϕ , r sin θ sin ϕ , r cos θ )
Force acting on a volume mass element near the point on the sphere:
d F = ∣ r c − r p ∣ 3 G ρ m d V ( r c − r p )
The density is written in term of spherical coordinates and:
d V = r 2 sin θ d r d θ d ϕ
The torque due to this elementary force about the origin is:
d τ = r p × d F
Substituting all expressions and simplifying:
d τ = d τ x i ^ + d τ y j ^ + d τ z k ^ d τ = ( f x i ^ + f y j ^ + f z k ^ ) d r d θ d ϕ
τ = ( ∫ 0 1 ∫ 0 π ∫ 0 2 π f x d r d θ d ϕ ) i ^ + ( ∫ 0 1 ∫ 0 π ∫ 0 2 π f y d r d θ d ϕ ) j ^ + ( ∫ 0 1 ∫ 0 π ∫ 0 2 π f z d r d θ d ϕ ) k ^ τ = τ x i ^ + τ y j ^ + τ z k ^
The required answer is:
∣ τ ∣ = τ x 2 + τ y 2 + τ z 2
The numerical integration is very time-consuming as it requires high numerical resolution for decent convergence. I consider myself lucky to have got the answer.