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Conservation laws as fundamental laws of nature
Exact laws
Approximate laws
Global and local conservation laws
Differential forms
Integral and weak forms
See also

Examples and applications

Notes
References
External links
Conservation law

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article is about conservation in physics. For the legal aspects of
environmental conservation, see Environmental law and Conservation movement. For
other uses, see Conservation (disambiguation).
In physics, a conservation law states that a particular measurable property of an
isolated physical system does not change as the system evolves over time. Exact
conservation laws include conservation of mass-energy, conservation of linear
momentum, conservation of angular momentum, and conservation of electric charge.
There are also many approximate conservation laws, which apply to such quantities
as mass, parity,[1] lepton number, baryon number, strangeness, hypercharge, etc.
These quantities are conserved in certain classes of physics processes, but not in
all.

A local conservation law is usually expressed mathematically as a continuity

equation, a partial differential equation which gives a relation between the amount
of the quantity and the "transport" of that quantity. It states that the amount of
the conserved quantity at a point or within a volume can only change by the amount
of the quantity which flows in or out of the volume.

From Noether's theorem, every differentiable symmetry leads to a local conservation

law.[2][3][4] Other conserved quantities can exist as well.

Conservation laws as fundamental laws of nature

Conservation laws are fundamental to our understanding of the physical world, in
that they describe which processes can or cannot occur in nature. For example, the
conservation law of energy states that the total quantity of energy in an isolated
system does not change, though it may change form. In general, the total quantity
of the property governed by that law remains unchanged during physical processes.
With respect to classical physics, conservation laws include conservation of
energy, mass (or matter), linear momentum, angular momentum, and electric charge.
With respect to particle physics, particles cannot be created or destroyed except
in pairs, where one is ordinary and the other is an antiparticle. With respect to
symmetries and invariance principles, three special conservation laws have been
described, associated with inversion or reversal of space, time, and charge.

Conservation laws are considered to be fundamental laws of nature, with broad

application in physics, as well as in other fields such as chemistry, biology,
geology, and engineering.

Most conservation laws are exact, or absolute, in the sense that they apply to all
possible processes. Some conservation laws are partial, in that they hold for some
processes but not for others.

One particularly important result concerning local conservation laws is Noether's

theorem, which states that there is a one-to-one correspondence between each one of
them and a differentiable symmetry of the Universe. For example, the local
conservation of energy follows from the uniformity of time and the local
conservation of angular momentum arises from the isotropy of space,[2][5][4] i.e.
because there is no preferred direction of space. Notably, there is no conservation
law associated with time-reversal, although more complex conservation laws
combining time-reversal with other symmetries are known.

Exact laws

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citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.
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A partial listing of physical conservation equations due to symmetry that are said
to be exact laws, or more precisely have never been proven to be violated:

Conservation law Respective Noether symmetry invariance Number of independent

parameters (i.e. dimension of phase space)
Conservation of mass-energy E Time-translation invariance Poincaré invariance
1 translation of time along t-axis
Conservation of linear momentum p Space-translation invariance 3 translation
of space along x,y,z axes
Conservation of angular momentum L = r × p Rotation invariance 3
rotation of space about x,y,z axes
Conservation of boost 3-vector N = tp − Er Lorentz-boost invariance 3
Lorentz-boost of space-time along x,y,z axes
Conservation of electric charge U(1)Q Gauge invariance 1 translation of
electrodynamic scalar potential field along V-axis (in phase space)
Conservation of color charge SU(3)C Gauge invariance 3 translation of
chromodynamic potential field along r,g,b-axes (in phase space)
Conservation of weak isospin SU(2)L Gauge invariance 1 translation of weak
potential field along axis in phase space
Conservation of the difference between baryon and lepton numbers B − L U(1)B−L
Gauge invariance 1
Another exact symmetry is CPT symmetry, the simultaneous inversion of space and
time coordinates, together with swapping all particles with their antiparticles;
however being a discrete symmetry Noether's theorem does not apply to it.
Accordingly, the conserved quantity, CPT parity, can usually not be meaningfully
calculated or determined.

Approximate laws

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citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed.
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There are also approximate conservation laws. These are approximately true in
particular situations, such as low speeds, short time scales, or certain
interactions.

Conservation of (macroscopic) mechanical energy (approximately true for processes

close to free of dissipative forces like friction)
Conservation of (rest) mass (approximately true for nonrelativistic speeds)
Conservation of baryon number (See chiral anomaly and sphaleron)
Conservation of lepton number (In the Standard Model)
Conservation of flavor (violated by the weak interaction)
Conservation of strangeness (violated by the weak interaction)
Conservation of space-parity (violated by the weak interaction)
Conservation of charge-parity (violated by the weak interaction)
Conservation of time-parity (violated by the weak interaction)
Conservation of CP parity (violated by the weak interaction); by the CPT theorem,
this is equivalent to conservation of time-parity.
Global and local conservation laws
The total amount of some conserved quantity in the universe could remain unchanged
if an equal amount were to appear at one point A and simultaneously disappear from
another separate point B. For example, an amount of energy could appear on Earth
without changing the total amount in the Universe if the same amount of energy were
to disappear from some other region of the Universe. This weak form of "global"
conservation is really not a conservation law because it is not Lorentz invariant,
so phenomena like the above do not occur in nature.[6][7] Due to special
relativity, if the appearance of the energy at A and disappearance of the energy at
B are simultaneous in one inertial reference frame, they will not be simultaneous
in other inertial reference frames moving with respect to the first. In a moving
frame one will occur before the other; either the energy at A will appear before or
after the energy at B disappears. In both cases, during the interval energy will
not be conserved.

A stronger form of conservation law requires that, for the amount of a conserved
quantity at a point to change, there must be a flow, or flux of the quantity into
or out of the point. For example, the amount of electric charge at a point is never
found to change without an electric current into or out of the point that carries
the difference in charge. Since it only involves continuous local changes, this
stronger type of conservation law is Lorentz invariant; a quantity conserved in one
reference frame is conserved in all moving reference frames.[6][7] This is called a
local conservation law.[6][7] Local conservation also implies global conservation;
that the total amount of the conserved quantity in the Universe remains constant.
All of the conservation laws listed above are local conservation laws. A local
conservation law is expressed mathematically by a continuity equation, which states
that the change in the quantity in a volume is equal to the total net "flux" of the
quantity through the surface of the volume. The following sections discuss
continuity equations in general.

Differential forms
See also: conservation form and continuity equation
In continuum mechanics, the most general form of an exact conservation law is given
by a continuity equation. For example, conservation of electric charge q is
∂
ρ
∂
t
=
−
∇
⋅
j
{\displaystyle {\frac {\partial \rho }{\partial t}}=-\nabla \cdot \mathbf
{j} \,}where ∇⋅ is the divergence operator, ρ is the density of q (amount per unit
volume), j is the flux of q (amount crossing a unit area in unit time), and t is
time.

If we assume that the motion u of the charge is a continuous function of position

and time, then
j
=
ρ
u
∂
ρ
∂
t
=
−
∇
⋅
(
ρ
u
)
.
{\displaystyle {\begin{aligned}\mathbf {j} &=\rho \mathbf {u} \\{\frac {\partial \
rho }{\partial t}}&=-\nabla \cdot (\rho \mathbf {u} )\,.\end{aligned}}}

In one space dimension this can be put into the form of a homogeneous first-order
quasilinear hyperbolic equation:[8]: 43
y
t
+
A
(
y
)
y
x
=
0
{\displaystyle y_{t}+A(y)y_{x}=0}where the dependent variable y is called the
density of a conserved quantity, and A(y) is called the current Jacobian, and the
subscript notation for partial derivatives has been employed. The more general
inhomogeneous case:
y
t
+
A
(
y
)
y
x
=
s
{\displaystyle y_{t}+A(y)y_{x}=s}is not a conservation equation but the general
kind of balance equation describing a dissipative system. The dependent variable y
is called a nonconserved quantity, and the inhomogeneous term s(y,x,t) is the-
source, or dissipation. For example, balance equations of this kind are the
momentum and energy Navier-Stokes equations, or the entropy balance for a general
isolated system.

In the one-dimensional space a conservation equation is a first-order quasilinear

hyperbolic equation that can be put into the advection form:
y
t
+
a
(
y
)
y
x
=
0
{\displaystyle y_{t}+a(y)y_{x}=0}where the dependent variable y(x,t) is called the
density of the conserved (scalar) quantity, and a(y) is called the current
coefficient, usually corresponding to the partial derivative in the conserved
quantity of a current density of the conserved quantity j(y):[8]: 43
a
(
y
)
=
j
y
(
y
)
{\displaystyle a(y)=j_{y}(y)}
In this case since the chain rule applies:
j
x
=
j
y
(
y
)
y
x
=
a
(
y
)
y
x
{\displaystyle j_{x}=j_{y}(y)y_{x}=a(y)y_{x}}the conservation equation can be put
into the current density form:
y
t
+
j
x
(
y
)
=
0
{\displaystyle y_{t}+j_{x}(y)=0}

In a space with more than one dimension the former definition can be extended to an
equation that can be put into the form:
y
t
+
a
(
y
)
⋅
∇
y
=
0
{\displaystyle y_{t}+\mathbf {a} (y)\cdot \nabla y=0}

where the conserved quantity is y(r,t), ⋅ denotes the scalar product, ∇ is the
nabla operator, here indicating a gradient, and a(y) is a vector of current
coefficients, analogously corresponding to the divergence of a vector current
density associated to the conserved quantity j(y):
y
t
+
∇
⋅
j
(
y
)
=
0
{\displaystyle y_{t}+\nabla \cdot \mathbf {j} (y)=0}

This is the case for the continuity equation:

ρ
t
+
∇
⋅
(
ρ
u
)
=
0
{\displaystyle \rho _{t}+\nabla \cdot (\rho \mathbf {u} )=0}

Here the conserved quantity is the mass, with density ρ(r,t) and current density
ρu, identical to the momentum density, while u(r, t) is the flow velocity.

In the general case a conservation equation can be also a system of this kind of
equations (a vector equation) in the form:[8]: 43
y
t
+
A
(
y
)
⋅
∇
y
=
0
{\displaystyle \mathbf {y} _{t}+\mathbf {A} (\mathbf {y} )\cdot \nabla \mathbf {y}
=\mathbf {0} }where y is called the conserved (vector) quantity, ∇y is its
gradient, 0 is the zero vector, and A(y) is called the Jacobian of the current
density. In fact as in the former scalar case, also in the vector case A(y) usually
corresponding to the Jacobian of a current density matrix J(y):
A
(
y
)
=
J
y
(
y
)
{\displaystyle \mathbf {A} (\mathbf {y} )=\mathbf {J} _{\mathbf {y} }(\mathbf
{y} )}and the conservation equation can be put into the form:
y
t
+
∇
⋅
J
(
y
)
=
0
{\displaystyle \mathbf {y} _{t}+\nabla \cdot \mathbf {J} (\mathbf {y} )=\mathbf {0}
}

For example, this the case for Euler equations (fluid dynamics). In the simple
incompressible case they are:
∇
⋅
u
=
0
,
∂
u
∂
t
+
u
⋅
∇
u
+
∇
s
=
0
,
{\displaystyle \nabla \cdot \mathbf {u} =0\,,\qquad {\frac {\partial \mathbf {u} }
{\partial t}}+\mathbf {u} \cdot \nabla \mathbf {u} +\nabla s=\mathbf {0} ,}

where:

u is the flow velocity vector, with components in a N-dimensional space u1,

u2, ..., uN,
s is the specific pressure (pressure per unit density) giving the source term,
See also: Euler equations (fluid dynamics)
It can be shown that the conserved (vector) quantity and the current density matrix
for these equations are respectively:

y
=
(
1
u
)
;
J
=
(
u
u
⊗
u
+
s
I
)
;
{\displaystyle {\mathbf {y} }={\begin{pmatrix}1\\\mathbf {u} \end{pmatrix}};\qquad
{\mathbf {J} }={\begin{pmatrix}\mathbf {u} \\\mathbf {u} \otimes \mathbf {u} +s\
mathbf {I} \end{pmatrix}};\qquad }

where
⊗
{\displaystyle \otimes } denotes the outer product.

Integral and weak forms

Conservation equations can usually also be expressed in integral form: the
advantage of the latter is substantially that it requires less smoothness of the
solution, which paves the way to weak form, extending the class of admissible
solutions to include discontinuous solutions.[8]: 62–63 By integrating in any
space-time domain the current density form in 1-D space:
y
t
+
j
x
(
y
)
=
0
{\displaystyle y_{t}+j_{x}(y)=0}and by using Green's theorem, the integral form is:
∫
−
∞
∞
y
d
x
+
∫
0
∞
j
(
y
)
d
t
=
0
{\displaystyle \int _{-\infty }^{\infty }y\,dx+\int _{0}^{\infty }j(y)\,dt=0}

In a similar fashion, for the scalar multidimensional space, the integral form is:
∮
[
y
d
N
r
+
j
(
y
)
d
t
]
=
0
{\displaystyle \oint \left[y\,d^{N}r+j(y)\,dt\right]=0}where the line integration
is performed along the boundary of the domain, in an anticlockwise manner.[8]: 62–
63

Moreover, by defining a test function φ(r,t) continuously differentiable both in

time and space with compact support, the weak form can be obtained pivoting on the
initial condition. In 1-D space it is:
∫
0
∞
∫
−
∞
∞
ϕ
t
y
+
ϕ
x
j
(
y
)
d
x
d
t
=
−
∫
−
∞
∞
ϕ
(
x
,
0
)
y
(
x
,
0
)
d
x
{\displaystyle \int _{0}^{\infty }\int _{-\infty }^{\infty }\phi _{t}y+\phi
_{x}j(y)\,dx\,dt=-\int _{-\infty }^{\infty }\phi (x,0)y(x,0)\,dx}
In the weak form all the partial derivatives of the density and current density
have been passed on to the test function, which with the former hypothesis is
sufficiently smooth to admit these derivatives.[8]: 62–63

See also
Invariant (physics)
Momentum
Cauchy momentum equation
Energy
Conservation of energy and the First law of thermodynamics
Conservative system
Conserved quantity
Some kinds of helicity are conserved in dissipationless limit: hydrodynamical
helicity, magnetic helicity, cross-helicity.
Principle of mutability
Conservation law of the Stress–energy tensor
Riemann invariant
Philosophy of physics
Totalitarian principle
Convection–diffusion equation
Uniformity of nature
Examples and applications
Advection
Mass conservation, or Continuity equation
Charge conservation
Euler equations (fluid dynamics)
inviscid Burgers equation
Kinematic wave
Conservation of energy
Traffic flow
Notes
Lee, T.D.; Yang, C.N. (1956). "Question of Parity Conservation in Weak
Interactions". Physical Review. 104 (1): 254–258. Bibcode:1956PhRv..104..254L.
doi:10.1103/PhysRev.104.254.
Ibragimov, N. H. CRC HANDBOOK OF LIE GROUP ANALYSIS OF DIFFERENTIAL EQUATIONS
VOLUME 1 -SYMMETRIES EXACT SOLUTIONS AND CONSERVATION LAWS. (CRC Press, 2023)
Kosmann-Schwarzbach, Y. in The Philosophy and Physics of Noether’s Theorems: A
Centenary Volume 4-24 (Cambridge University Press, 2022)
Rao, A. K., Tripathi, A., Chauhan, B. & Malik, R. P. Noether Theorem and
Nilpotency Property of the (Anti-)BRST Charges in the BRST Formalism: A Brief
Review. Universe 8 (2022). https://doi.org/10.3390/universe8110566
Kosmann-Schwarzbach, Y. in The Philosophy and Physics of Noether’s Theorems: A
Centenary Volume 4-24 (Cambridge University Press, 2022).
Aitchison, Ian J. R.; Hey, Anthony J.G. (2012). Gauge Theories in Particle
Physics: A Practical Introduction: From Relativistic Quantum Mechanics to QED,
Fourth Edition, Vol. 1. CRC Press. p. 43. ISBN 978-1466512993. Archived from the
original on 2018-05-04.
Will, Clifford M. (1993). Theory and Experiment in Gravitational Physics.
Cambridge Univ. Press. p. 105. ISBN 978-0521439732. Archived from the original on
2017-02-20.
Toro, E.F. (1999). "Chapter 2. Notions on Hyperbolic PDEs". Riemann Solvers and
Numerical Methods for Fluid Dynamics. Springer-Verlag. ISBN 978-3-540-65966-2.
References
Philipson, Schuster, Modeling by Nonlinear Differential Equations: Dissipative and
Conservative Processes, World Scientific Publishing Company 2009.
Victor J. Stenger, 2000. Timeless Reality: Symmetry, Simplicity, and Multiple
Universes. Buffalo NY: Prometheus Books. Chpt. 12 is a gentle introduction to
symmetry, invariance, and conservation laws.
E. Godlewski and P.A. Raviart, Hyperbolic systems of conservation laws, Ellipses,
1991.
External links
Media related to Conservation laws at Wikimedia Commons
Conservation Laws – Ch. 11–15 in an online textbook
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Categories: Conservation lawsScientific lawsSymmetryThermodynamic systems
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