Orthogonal Families

• Suppose the function is analytic in some

domain . Then the real and imaginary parts of can be used to
define two families of curves in .
• The equations and ,
where and are arbitrary real constants,
are called level curves of and , respectively.
The level curves are orthogonal families.
Proof. Consider any arbitrary point of intersection of two fixed level curves belonging
to the previously mentioned families to be , where we further
suppose that . We also assume that and
. Then we calculate the relation between the slopes of the tangent
lines to the level curves and . We differentiate
with respect to using the chain rule and obtain

We again differentiate with respect to and get

Now we find the values of from both the equations and obtain
respectively. Finally, multiplying the slopes and using Cauchy-Riemann equations,
we get

Hence the tangent lines at are perpendicular to each other.

INCOMPRESSIBLE FLUID FLOWS*
Consider the irrotational motion of a frictionless, incompressible fluid
moving in planes parallel to the -plane (that is, planar flow). Suppose that

is the two dimensional velocity field of a fluid particle.

Then and (as irrotational motion)
for some scalar potential .
Since the flow is incompressible,
or
that is is harmonic, which is called a velocity potential of the fluid flow.
*This part is prepared by following Prof. T. Phaneendra’s note
Note that there exists a harmonic conjugate of such that
is analytic, and the harmonic conjugate is called
the stream function.
It follows that the level curves
and
are orthogonal.
The level curves corresponding to the velocity potential are known as
equipotential curves, and the level curves corresponding to the stream
function are called the stream lines.
Stream lines represent the actual paths along which the fluid particles will
move.
Complex Potential: The flow pattern is fully represented by the analytic
function , called the complex potential.
The velocity vector is the gradient of , this means that

and
Ex1. Given that is the velocity potential for the planar flow of an
incompressible and irrotational fluid. Assume an appropriate domain of the plane.
Find the velocity field of the flow.

Ex2. Find if can represent the equipotential for an

electric field. Find the corresponding complex potential and also , if
possible.