Abstract
When Laplace and Legendre began their investigations of mathematical physics, this was in a major way a research in differential equations. The Laplacean Δ(3) was dominant and the necessity to find many solutions of Δ(3)U = 0 led to the method of separation of variables, which reduced the three-dimensional problems to three intertwined one-dimensional problems.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1998 Springer Science+Business Media New York
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Müller, C. (1998). Spherical Harmonics and Differential Equations. In: Analysis of Spherical Symmetries in Euclidean Spaces. Applied Mathematical Sciences, vol 129. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-0581-4_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-0581-4_4
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-1-4612-6827-7
Online ISBN: 978-1-4612-0581-4
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive