Can someone explain how this integral of a third derivative works

derivativesintegration

I'm reading some notes on the derivation of the Friedmann equation from Newton's formulas The paper reads:

The equation of motion for $R_s(t)$ can be obtained from the gravitational acceleration at the outer
edge of the sphere:

$$\frac{d^2R_s}{dt^2}=-\frac{GM_s}{R_s(t)^2}$$
Multiplying both sides by $dR_s/dt$ and integrating converts this "acceleration equation" to an "energy equation":
$$\frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{dR}{dt}\right)^2=\frac{GM_s}{R_s(t)}+U$$
I'm afraid I can't follow the r.h.s. of this derivation. It looks like they took the third integral of the radius and then integrated it over $R_s$, but my intuition tells me that taking the integral of the derivative gets you right back where you started. Could someone please explain this part of the derivation?

Is $\frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{dR}{dt}\right)^2$ just another way of writing $\frac{d^2R_s}{dt^2}$?

Best Answer

Let's work backwards from the end of your question:

Is $\frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{dR}{dt}\right)^2$ just another way of writing $\frac{d^2R_s}{dt^2}$?

No, it's not. The latter expression is (almost, but not quite) the derivative of the former expression.

This might be easier to see if you introduce a change of variable to reduce some of the noise in the formula. Let's write $u(t) = \frac{dR}{dt}$. Then the first expression is $\frac12 \left( u(t) \right)^2$. It's derivative (with respect to $t$) is, by the Chain Rule, $u(t) \cdot u'(t)$. That is, $$\frac{d}{dt} \left( \frac12 \left(\frac{dR}{dt}\right)^2 \right) = \frac{dR}{dt}\cdot \frac{d^2R}{dt^2}$$

Now let's try to understand what the text is saying.

Multiplying both sides by $dR_s/t$...

I suspect there is a typo in here, as it should say "Multiplying both sides by $dR_s/dt$". If we do this, the original equation becomes $$\frac{d^2R_s}{dt^2} \cdot \frac{dR_s}{dt} =-\frac{GM_s}{R_s(t)^2} \cdot \frac{dR_s}{dt}$$

Now let's integrate both sides with respect to $t$. We have $$\int \frac{d^2R_s}{dt^2} \cdot \frac{dR_s}{dt} \, dt =- \int \frac{GM_s}{R_s(t)^2} \cdot \frac{dR_s}{dt} \, dt$$

Let's tackle these two integrals separately. For the left-hand side, we will use the substitution $u(t) = \frac{dR}{dt}$. (This is the same substitution I used at the start of this answer!) Then the left-hand side reads $\int u'(t) \cdot u(t) \, dt$. This is exactly the same thing as $\int u \, du$, which integrates easily to $\frac12 u^2$. In other words, the left-hand side is $\frac{1}{2}\left(\frac{dR}{dt}\right)^2$.

Now for the right-hand side. This time set $v = R_s(t)$. Then (setting aside some constants) the integral is $\int v^{-2} dv$, which is easy to integrate, and we get $-\frac1v$. So the integral on the right is $\frac{GM_s}{R_s(t)}$.

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