Physics Asked on August 18, 2021
given the gauge choice that div A = some value/function.
i am completely fine that in the context of electromagnetism that by setting the divergence of this to be anything it has no effect on the curl of A e.g the magnetic field. as letting A= A + grad(f) means curl of grad(f) = 0
however in doing so you are changing the electric field given by phi – d(a)/dt
so why can you make this transformation and not change anything?
wikipedia says that by doing a transformation like this you have to do the transformation phi=phi-df/dt to keep the E field the same
But… how does simply setting div a = a value encompass this second transformation
Electric and magnetic fields are related to potentials this way
$$vec{B}=vec{nabla}timesvec{A} tag{1}$$ $$vec{E}=-vec{nabla}phi-frac{partial vec{A}}{partial t}. tag{2}$$
A gauge transformation for those potentials is
$$phi´=phi-frac{partial f(vec{x},t)}{partial t} tag{3}$$ $$vec{A}´=vec{A}+vec{nabla}f(vec{x},t), tag{4}$$
which leaves the fields $(1)$ and $(2)$ invariant.
Suppose that we have the potentials $(phi,vec{A})$, and we perform a gauge transformation $(phi,vec{A})rightarrow(phi´,vec{A}´)$ so that the new potentials satisfy
$$vec{nabla}cdotvec{A}´=g(vec{x},t).tag{5}$$
Is this posible? That is, is there any $f(vec{x},t)$ connecting $(phi,vec{A})$ and $(phi´,vec{A}´)$ through $(3)$ and $(4)$ that makes $vec{A}´$ satisfy $(5)$?.
Taking the divergence of $(4)$ gives us
$$g(vec{x},t)=vec{nabla}cdotvec{A}+nabla ^2f(vec{x},t),$$ which is Poisson's equation for $f(vec{x},t)$, and the solution (appart from solutions to the homogeneous equation, i.e. Laplace's equation) is
$$f(vec{x},t)=-int d^3vec{x}'frac{g(vec{x}')-vec{nabla}'cdotvec{A}}{4pi|vec{x}-vec{x}'|},tag{6}$$
where $vec{nabla}'$ indicates derivatives with respect to $x', y', z'$.
So our new vector potential $vec{A}´$ will satisfy $(5)$ and will describe the same fields that our old potential did.
Edit:
Note that $phi$ must also be transformed via $(3)$ with the same $f$ in order to keep the fields invariant.
Correct answer by AFG on August 18, 2021
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