Tutorial Exercises: Geometric Connections

1. Geodesics in the Isotropic Mercator Projection When the surface of the globe is projected onto a at map some aspects of the map are inevitably distorted. Mapmakers can choose which specic properties to preserve. For navigation at sea the angles between directions are critical. Mercator wanted angles on the map to correspond to angles on the sphere. This will only occur if the metric for the map is isotropic: gij is a multiple of the identity matrix, or equivalently ds2 has the factorised form ds2 = A(x, y )(dx2 + dy 2 ). (a) Starting from standard spherical polar coordinates show that the distance on a sphere of unit radius is given by the metric ds2 = d2 + cos2 d2 where is the longitude and =
2

(b) Now consider a transformation of coordinates to the 2D plane to draw maps. Let = x and let be some unknown function of y . Find the relationship between and y which makes the metric for the map isotropic and identify the common coecient A. It is convenient to make y = 0 the equator. (c) Rearrange the result from above to show that y and are related by the following interesting relations tan = sinh y sin = tanh y cos = sechy When these relationships hold y is said to be the Gudermannian of . You should now be able to write the coecient A as a function of y and thus have the metric in terms of the new variables. (d) Write down the Lagrangian that is equivalent to the metric you have found. Using rst integrals determine the equation for the shape of the geodesics. Show that sinh y = sin(x + ) where and are constants is the general solution (by substitution). Solution (a) Start from ds2 = d 2 + sin2 d2 . Since =
2

is the latitude.

then d = d and cos = sin thus ds2 = d2 + cos2 d2 .

(b) If we change variables the metric becomes ds2 = ( d 2 2 ) dy + cos2 dx2 . dy

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2 2 which is isotropic if the two coecients are equal A = ( d dy ) = cos thus

d = cos dy We choose the positive sign so that the map will have north in the positive y direction (unless we want to make one of those upside-down Australia at the top-of-the-world maps. This rst order ODE can be solved by separation to give y= sec d = ln(sec + tan ) + C

We choose the constant C to be zero, so that the equator = 0 corresponds to the horizontal axis y = 0. We also have A(x, y ) = cos2 but we need to write this is terms of x and y which is the next part of the question. (c) Re-arrange to give exp(y ) = sec + tan and 1 sec tan = = sec tan sec + tan sec2 tan2 By adding and subtracting one can immediately get exp(y ) = tan = sinh y sec = cosh y The given relationships follow from these. We also thus have A(x, y ) = sech2 y or ds2 = sech2 (y )(dx2 + dy 2 ). (d) The equivalent Lagrangian is L= and the equivalent Hamiltonian is H= 1 2 cosh2 (y )(p2 x + py ). 2 1 sech2 (y )(x 2 + y 2 ). 2

Working with the Lagrangian we can identify two rst integrals (one for t and one for x) 1 2 + y 2) E = sech2 (y )(x 2 and P = sech2 (y )x Since we are interested in the shape of the geodesic we will also use for the rst derivative dy y = . dx x Combining these three results gives us the equation dy 2E = cosh2 (y )[1 + ( )2 ] 2 P dx 107

This equation can be solved by separation... however since I have told you the solution you can start with that and dierentiate it implicitly to nd cosh y Substituting this into the DE gives 2E = cosh2 (y ) + 2 cos2 (x + ) = 1 + sinh2 (y ) + 2 cos2 (x + ) P2 and then substituting in the expression for sinh(y ) gives 2E = 1 + 2 sin2 (x + ) + 2 cos2 (x + ) = 1 + 2 P2 Thus the equation does satisfy the DE. One of the two arbitrary constants is related to E and P as given above. The other arbitrary constant arises because you can choose the zero for longitude anyway you like: for example, passing through Greenwich in England. By the way, converting the curve back to longitude and latitude yields tan = sin( + ) or in spherical-polars cot = sin( + ) the SAME equation for a great circle that was obtained in an earlier tute. 2. An Area-preserving map A small element of area on the surface of a unit sphere is given by dAsphere = sin dd, whereas on a at map an element of area is dAf lat = dxdy . (a) Write the surface area element dAsphere in terms of the latitude . (b) Find a mapping x = and y = g() from the sphere to a plane that preserves area, dAsphere = dAf lat . (c) Starting with the distance between points on the sphere, show that the distance between points on the projected map is given by ds2 = (1 y 2 )dx2 + 1 dy 2 1 y2 dy = cos(x + ) dx

(d) Find the geodesics in terms of an integral. The integral is elliptic so do not try to do it. Solution (a) In terms of the latitude the surface area element is trivially cos dd. We do not need to worry about the minus sign. (b) If x = and y = g() then dxdy = g ()dd. Thus if area is preserved g () = cos . Thus g() = sin . (c) Thus dx = d and dy = cos d = 1 y 2 d. Thus since ds2 = d2 + cos2 d2 this gives 1 dy 2 1 y2

ds2 = (1 y 2 )dx2 +

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(d) The equivalent Lagrangian is 1 1 2 + y 2] L = [(1 y 2 )x 2 1 y2 There are two rst integrals associated with t and x P = (1 y 2 )x and E= and we also use 1 1 [(1 y 2 )x 2 + y 2] 2 1 y2 y dy = . dx x 1 1 dy P 2 [1 + ( )2 ] 2(1 y 2 ) (1 y 2 )2 dx

which combine to give E= This can be rearranged to give (1 y 2 ) dy = dx P or separating variables to give x= We know that a great circle is tan = cot = sin( + ) So in terms of x and y we have . y 1 y2 = sin(x + ) (1 y 2 ) P dy 2(1 y 2 )E P 2 . 2(1 y 2 )E P 2

and one can show that this satises the DE given above.

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