The stability of rotating masses of liquid; note to a former paper

Extract

In these Proceedings, Vol. xx (1920), pp. 198–204, the writer ventured (l.c. p. 203) on some remarks as to the reason why Sir G. Darwin and Mr Jeans had obtained discordant results for the stability of the pear-shaped figure of equilibrium, suggesting that this was due to a different mode of expansion of the functions involved. Sir G. Darwin used an infinite series of Lamé functions; Mr Jeans' method was equivalent to using the early parts from an expansion, of which every term, when expressed as an integral series of Lamé functions, would be an infinite series. At that time there was difficulty in obtaining Liapounoff's papers; since then, by the kindness of M. Belopolsky, of Pulkova, the whole of the four parts of Liapounoff's publication “Sur les figures d'équilibre peu différentes des ellipsoïdes d'une masse liquide homogène douèe d'un mouvement de rotation,” in all over 750 large folio pages, have become available; and these are now in the market. It is particularly interesting to see that the fourth part (1914) is devoted precisely to that change in the method of development which would arise in passing from Sir G. Darwin's expansion to the other expansion referred to above. And it is only by this change that Liapounoff is able to give the general proof of a form of expression of his results—in terms of polynomials and not infinite series—upon which his theorem of instability is made to depend. The careful consideration of the convergence of his expansions, which adds so greatly to the length of Liapounoff's papers, supplies materials for the proof that the expansion used in Mr Jeans' paper can be placed on a sure foundation, while Sir G. Darwin's expansion requires an estimation of the remainder.