The co-divergence of vector valued currents (Q765033)

In the context of stress theory of the mechanics of continuous media, a generalization of the boundary operator for de Rham currents -- the co-divergence operator is introduced. While the boundary operator of de Rham's theory applies to real valued currents, the co-divergence operator acts on vector valued currents, i.e., functionals dual to differential forms valued in a vector bundle. From the point of view of continuum mechanics, the framework presented here allows for the formulation of the principal notions of continuum mechanics on a manifold that does not have a Riemannian metric or a connection while at the same time allowing irregular bodies and velocity fields. This work consists of the following basic parts: introduction; notation and preliminaries; the velocity field on a body as a vector valued current; the velocity field on the boundary of a body as a vector valued current; the Cauchy-stress as a vector valued form; the variational-stress as a vector valued form; the Cauchy-stress induced by a variational stress; the divergence of a variational stress; the case where the vector bundle is trivial; the boundary and co-divergence of a vector field; the boundary of a vector field in case of a trivial bundle; the co-divergence in the general case; the co-divergence for the case of a trivial bundle.