Surface integral in a scalar field

Calculate the total amount of rainfall on a hill which has

approximately the form of a cone if the precipitation rate is linearly
proportionate to the height above the sea level.
Mathematical model:
The hill is ideally a cone and, with a height h and radius r, it
may have the following parametric equations:
u 2 + v2
x = u , y = v, z = h , [u , v ] M
r
where M is a circle with a radius of r and the centre at
the origin.
v
z
M

h r u

r y
x
The precipitation rate in millimetres can be expressed as
p ( x, y , y ) = c z
where c is an appropriate constant.

To calculate the total amount of rainfall R fallen on the hill, we

have to add up the precipitation rate p( x, y, y ) over the
whole hill surface area H.

We will call this quantity the surface integral of p( x, y, y )

with respect to H and denote by

R = p( x, y, z ) dS
H

dS is sometimes called the element of surface

 Exact definition
Let us further assume that a continuous function f(x,y,z) is defined
on a a simple surface : x = (u , v ), y = (u , v ), z = (u , v ), [u , v ] M

where M is a contiguous planar area contained within a regular

curve M z f ( x, y , z )
v
M
[x,y,z]

M y

x
u
To define exactly the surface integral of f(x,y,z) with respect to ,
let us first introduce a partition P with a norm N(P) (the area of
the largest rectangle.

z C
P
v
Si
S

Mi
M y

This generates a curvilinear

x partition C of
u
On each SiC let us select an arbitrary point [xi, yi, zi] and
calculate| Si | f(xi, yi, zi) where | Si | is the area of Si.
We can now define the integral sum
I (M , P, , Q, f ) = f (x , y , z ) S
i i i i
S i Q

If lim I (M , P, , Q, f ) exists, we define the surface integral of

N ( P )0

f(x,y,z) with respect to S as:

f (x, y, z ) dS = lim I (M , P, , Q, f )
N ( P )0
To calculate a surface integral, we replace each Si by the
parallelogram S i defined by the tangent vectors t u , t v at the
bottom left corner of Si
C
z
u u
A=
tu
Si v v
Si
tv u u
B=
v v
y
u u
C=
v v
We have Si S i = A2 + B 2 + C 2 where

x
Then we can write

f (x, y, z ) dS = lim I (M , P, , Q, f ) = lim

N ( P )0 N ( P )0
f (x , y , z ) S
S i C
i i i i =

= lim f ( xi , yi , zi ) S i = lim f ( xi , y i , z i ) A 2 + B 2 + C 2 =
N ( P ) 0 N ( P ) 0
S i C S i Q

= f ( (u , v ), (u , v ), (u , v )) A2 + B 2 + C 2 du dv
M

So the formula for calculating a surface integral is:

f ( x, y, z ) dS = f ( (u , v ), (u , v ), (u , v )) A2 + B 2 + C 2 du dv
M
Example

Let us calculate the motivating example. We will obtain the following

surface integral:

u 2 + v2
H c z dS where H: x = u, y = v, z = h r , [u, v] M
M : x = cos , y = sin , [ , ] [0, r ] [0,2 ]

The tangent vectors are:

u v
t u = 1i + 0 j + k, t v = 0i + 1 j + k
r u +v
2 2
r u +v
2 2

and so we have:
u v
A= , B= , C =1
r u +v
2 2
r u +v
2 2
This yields

u 2
v 2
1 + r 2
A2 + B 2 + C 2 = 2 2 + 2 2 +1 =
r (u + v ) r (u + v )
2 2
r

and we get the following double integral:

u2 + v2 1 + r 2
R = h
du dv
M
r r

After some simplification, we can write

1+ r2
R=

1
h du dv (u + v ) du dv
2 2

r M rM
Calculating, we obtain

2
1+ r2
r
1
R= hr d d
2 2

r r 0 0

where in the second integral we used the transformation

u = cos , v = sin , [ , ] [0, r ] [0,2 ].

Completing the calculation, we have

1+ r2 1 r3 2 r
R= hr 2 = 1 + r hr 2 =
2

r r 3 3
3h 2r
= r 1 + r 2

3
 Surface integral in a vector field
What is the force of wind blowing at an angle of 45o with force con-
stantly increasing as we rise from the sea level driving a raft with a sail
that has the form of one eighth of a cylindrical surface?
Mathematical model

The sail is ideally an eighth of a cylindrical surface with a

height h and radius r situated, say, in the first octant as
shown in the figure below. Then it has the equations

x = r cos u , y = r sin u , z = v, [u, v] [0, 4 ] [0, h]

The vector field of the wind

can be modeled as
h
w = c zi + 0 j + 0k
r

4
In physics, the force with which the vector field w = czi + 0 j + 0k
affects a surface S at a point [x,y,z] is the scalar product of w
with the normal n at [x,y,z]. Thus if, for example, the wind
blew parallel to the tangent plane at [x,y,z], the resulting force
would be zero. All we have to do to calculate the total force of
the wind acting upon the sail is "add up" the products w n
over all the sail surface. This operation in the case of continuous
functions is called the surface integral of the second type of the
vector field over the surface S and in our caser we would use the
following notation: cz dy dz + 0 dx dz + 0 dx dy
S
Definition
Let a continuous vector field f ( x, y, z ) = f1 i + f 2 j + f 3 k be defined
on a a simple surface : x = (u , v ), y = (u , v ), z = (u , v ), [u , v ] M
where M is a contiguous planar area contained within a regular
curve M
z n tu f ( x, y , z )
v
M
[x,y,z] tv

M y
t u = 'u i + ' u j + 'u k
u
x t v = 'v i + 'v j + 'v k
n = Ai + B j + C k
Let us again introduce a partition P with a norm N(P) with the
resulting curvilinear partition C of .

z C
P
v

Si
S

Mi
M y

x
u
On each SiQ let us select an arbitrary point [xi, yi, zi] and
calculate n f at this point.
We can now define the integral sum

I ( , Q, f ) = f ( x , y , z )A + f ( x , y , z )B + f ( x , y , z )C
1 i i i 2 i i i 1 i i i
S i Q

If lim I (M , P, , Q, f ) = I exists, we define its value as

N ( P ) 0

the surface integral of f(x,y,z) with respect to S. Formally:

f ( x, y, z ) dydz + f ( x, y, z ) dxdz + f ( x, y, z ) dxdy = I

1 2 3
 Sometimes the following vector notation is used:

f ( x, y, z ) dydz + f ( x, y, z ) dxdz + f ( x, y, z ) dxdy = f ( x, y, z ) d S

1 2 3

The formula for calculating a second-type surface integral

of the vector field f(x,y,z) can be derived in a way similar to
that for the surface integral of the first type

f ( x, y, z ) dS = f ( , , )A + f ( , , )B + f ( , , )C dudv
M
1 2 3

where is either 1 or -1 if depending on whether is oriented in

correspondence with the parametric equations or not.
Example
We will again calculate the motivating example. Here the equat-
ions of the surface, that is, the sail S are

x = r cos u , y = r sin u , z = v, [u, v] [0, 4 ] [0, h]

and the vector field of the blowing wind is given as

w = c zi + 0 j + 0k
Let us first calculate n
n = ( r sin u i + r cos u j + 0 k ) (0i + 0 j + 1 k ) =

= r cos u i + r sin u j + 0 k
We see that, for v[0,/2], z[0,h] we have w n czr cos u 0

and so, for practical reasons, we will orientate the sail in correspon-
dence with the parametric equations since we want the force of the
wind to be positive. Then we can write:

cz dydz + 0 dxdz + 0 dxdy = cvr cos u du dv =

S M

2 h
crh 2
= cr cos u du v dv =
0 0
2