1

The virial theorem

Consider a collection of particles with masses mi , i = 1, 2, . . . N . Let the complete system be in a steady state, where the individual particles move around but the overall description of the system does not change qualitatively; i.e., its macroscopic parameters remain within certain bounds. Then we can obtain a relation between the kinetic and potential energies of the system. The equations of motion for the ith particle are pi = Fi Write G=
i

(1) (2)

pi ri

Then

G=
i

pi ri +
i

pi vi =
i

Fi ri + 2T

(3)

Let us compute the time average of each quantity over time . The time average of a quantity Q is given by 1 dtQ(t) (4) Q= t=0 Computing these time averages we nd 1
0

Gdt = 2T +
i

Fi ri

(5)

In a steady state, the dierence G( ) G(0) will remain nite, so if we take the large limit we will get 1 1 (6) Gdt = [G( ) G(0)] 0 0 So we nd that in steady state T = 1 2 Fi ri
i

(7)

where the time averages are now assumed to be taken with the limit . The RHS of the above equation does not make much physical sense as it stands, but we will now evaluate it for a specic force law. Let us consider a 2-body central force, given by a potential V 1 ij (rij )n (8) V = 2
j=i

where rij = |ri rj | 1 (9)

is the distance between particles i and j. Then the force on the kth particle is obtained by taking the gradient with respect to rk (with a negative sign) 1 Fk = k 2
n ij rij j=i

(10)

The variable rk appears in two ways in the expression above: 1 Fk = k 2 We have k rkj = k [(rk rj ) (rk rj )] 2 = k rjk = k [(rj rk ) (rj rk )] 2 = So we get Fk =
j=k n1 kj nrkj
1 1

j=k

1 n kj rkj k 2

n jk rjk j=k

(11)

1 (rk rj ) rkj

(12) (13)

1 1 (rj rk ) = (rk rj ) rjk rkj

1 (rk rj ) rkj

(14)

Now we compute our quantity of interest Fk rk =

k j=k n1 kj nrkj

1 (rk rj ) rk rkj

(15)

Note that jk = kj , and rjk = rkj . Interchanging the dummy labels j, k we can also write Fk rk =
k j=k n1 kj nrkj

1 (rj rk ) rj rkj

(16)

Adding the above two expressions for Fk rk =

k

Fk rk and dividing by 2, we get

n kj nrkj = nV k=j

1 2

n1 kj nrkj j=k

1 1 (rk rj ) (rk rj ) = rkj 2 1 2 n V 2

(17)

Thus we have found that T =

Fk rk =
k

(18)

For the Kepler potential we have n = 1 and we get 1 T = V 2 (19)