Lecture 1

Introduction, Maxwell’s
Equations

In the beginning, this field is either known as electricity and magnetism or optics. But later,
as we shall discuss, these two fields are found to be based on the same set equations known as
Maxwell’s equations. Maxwell’s equations unified these two fields, and it is common to call
the study of electromagnetic theory based on Maxwell’s equations electromagnetics. It has
wide-ranging applications from statics to ultra-violet light in the present world with impact
on many different technologies.

1.1 Importance of Electromagnetics

We will explain why electromagnetics is so important, and its impact on very many different
areas. Then we will give a brief history of electromagnetics, and how it has evolved in the
modern world. Next we will go briefly over Maxwell’s equations in their full glory. But we
will begin the study of electromagnetics by focussing on static problems which are valid in
the long-wavelength limit.
It has been based on Maxwell’s equations, which are the result of the seminal work of
James Clerk Maxwell completed in 1865, after his presentation to the British Royal Society
in 1864. It has been over 150 years ago now, and this is a long time compared to the leaps
and bounds progress we have made in technological advancements. Nevertheless, research in
electromagnetics has continued unabated despite its age. The reason is that electromagnetics
is extremely useful, and has impacted a large sector of modern technologies.
To understand why electromagnetics is so useful, we have to understand a few points
about Maxwell’s equations.
ˆ Maxwell’s equations are valid over a vast length scale from subatomic dimensions to
galactic dimensions. Hence, these equations are valid over a vast range of wavelengths,
going from static to ultra-violet wavelengths.1
1 Current lithography process is working with using ultra-violet light with a wavelength of 193 nm.

1
2 Electromagnetic Field Theory

ˆ Maxwell’s equations are relativistic invariant in the parlance of special relativity [1]. In
fact, Einstein was motivated with the theory of special relativity in 1905 by Maxwell’s
equations [2]. These equations look the same, irrespective of what inertial reference
frame one is in.

ˆ Maxwell’s equations are valid in the quantum regime, as it was demonstrated by Paul
Dirac in 1927 [3]. Hence, many methods of calculating the response of a medium to
classical field can be applied in the quantum regime also. When electromagnetic theory
is combined with quantum theory, the field of quantum optics came about. Roy Glauber
won a Nobel prize in 2005 because of his work in this area [4].

ˆ Maxwell’s equations and the pertinent gauge theory has inspired Yang-Mills theory
(1954) [5], which is also known as a generalized electromagnetic theory. Yang-Mills
theory is motivated by differential forms in differential geometry [6]. To quote from
Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler, “Differential forms illuminate electromagnetic theory,
and electromagnetic theory illuminates differential forms.” [7, 8]

ˆ Maxwell’s equations are some of the most accurate physical equations that have been
validated by experiments. In 1985, Richard Feynman wrote that electromagnetic theory
had been validated to one part in a billion.2 Now, it has been validated to one part in
a trillion (Aoyama et al, Styer, 2012).3

ˆ As a consequence, electromagnetics has had a tremendous impact in science and tech-

nology. This is manifested in electrical engineering, optics, wireless and optical commu-
nications, computers, remote sensing, bio-medical engineering etc.

2 This means that if a jet is to fly from New York to Los Angeles, an error of one part in a billion means

an error of a few millmeters.

3 This means an error of a hairline, if one were to fly from the earth to the moon.
Introduction, Maxwell’s Equations 3

Figure 1.1: The impact of electromagnetics in many technologies. The areas in blue are
prevalent areas impacted by electromagnetics some 20 years ago [9], and the areas in brown
are modern emerging areas impacted by electromagnetics.
4 Electromagnetic Field Theory

Figure 1.2: Knowledge grows like a tree. Engineering knowledge and real-world applica-
tions are driven by fundamental knowledge from math and sciences. At a university, we do
science-based engineering research that can impact wide-ranging real-world applications. But
everyone is equally important in transforming our society. Just like the parts of the human
body, no one can claim that one is more important than the others.

Figure 1.2 shows how knowledge are driven by basic math and science knowledge. Its
growth is like a tree. It is important that we collaborate to develop technologies that can
transform this world.

1.1.1 A Brief History of Electromagnetics

Electricity and magnetism have been known to mankind for a long time. Also, the physical
properties of light have been known. But electricity and magnetism, now termed electromag-
netics in the modern world, has been thought to be governed by different physical laws as
opposed to optics. This is understandable as the physics of electricity and magnetism is quite
different of the physics of optics as they were known to humans then.
For example, lode stone was known to the ancient Greek and Chinese around 600 BC to
400 BC. Compass was used in China since 200 BC. Static electricity was reported by the
Greek as early as 400 BC. But these curiosities did not make an impact until the age of
telegraphy. The coming about of telegraphy was due to the invention of the voltaic cell or
the galvanic cell in the late 1700’s, by Luigi Galvani and Alesandro Volta [10]. It was soon
discovered that two pieces of wire, connected to a voltaic cell, can transmit information.
Introduction, Maxwell’s Equations 5

So by the early 1800’s this possibility had spurred the development of telegraphy. Both
André-Marie Ampére (1823) [11, 12] and Michael Faraday (1838) [13] did experiments to
better understand the properties of electricity and magnetism. And hence, Ampere’s law and
Faraday law are named after them. Kirchhoff voltage and current laws were also developed
in 1845 to help better understand telegraphy [14, 15]. Despite these laws, the technology of
telegraphy was poorly understood. For instance, it was not known as to why the telegraphy
signal was distorted. Ideally, the signal should be a digital signal switching between one’s
and zero’s, but the digital signal lost its shape rapidly along a telegraphy line.4

It was not until 1865 that James Clerk Maxwell [17] put in the missing term in Am-
pere’s law, the displacement current term, only then the mathematical theory for electricity
and magnetism was complete. Ampere’s law is now known as generalized Ampere’s law.
The complete set of equations are now named Maxwell’s equations in honor of James Clerk
Maxwell.

The rousing success of Maxwell’s theory was that it predicted wave phenomena, as they
have been observed along telegraphy lines. But it was not until 23 years later that Heinrich
Hertz in 1888 [18] did experiment to prove that electromagnetic field can propagate through
space across a room. This illustrates the difficulty of knowledge dissemination when new
knowledge is discovered. Moreover, from experimental measurement of the permittivity and
permeability of matter, it was decided that electromagnetic wave moves at a tremendous
speed. But the velocity of light has been known for a long while from astronomical obser-
vations (Roemer, 1676) [19]. The observation of interference phenomena in light has been
known as well. When these pieces of information were pieced together, it was decided that
electricity and magnetism, and optics, are actually governed by the same physical law or
Maxwell’s equations. And optics and electromagnetics are unified into one field!

4 As a side note, in 1837, Morse invented the Morse code for telegraphy [16]. There were cross pollination

of ideas across the Atlantic ocean despite the distance. In fact, Benjamin Franklin associated lightning with
electricity in the latter part of the 18-th century. Also, notice that electrical machinery was invented in 1832
even though electromagnetic theory was not fully understood.
6 Electromagnetic Field Theory

Figure 1.3: A brief history of electromagnetics and optics as depicted in this figure.

In Figure 1.3, a brief history of electromagnetics and optics is depicted. In the begin-
ning, it was thought that electricity and magnetism, and optics were governed by different
physical laws. Low frequency electromagnetics was governed by the understanding of fields
and their interaction with media. Optical phenomena were governed by ray optics, reflection
and refraction of light. But the advent of Maxwell’s equations in 1865 revealed that they
can be unified under electromagnetic theory. Then solving Maxwell’s equations becomes a
mathematical endeavor.
The photo-electric effect [20,21], and Planck radiation law [22] point to the fact that elec-
tromagnetic energy is manifested in terms of packets of energy, indicating the corpuscular
nature of light. Each unit of this energy is now known as the photon. A photon carries an en-
ergy packet equal to ~ω, where ω is the angular frequency of the photon and ~ = 6.626×10−34
J s, the Planck constant, which is a very small constant. Hence, the higher the frequency,
the easier it is to detect this packet of energy, or feel the graininess of electromagnetic en-
ergy. Eventually, in 1927 [3], quantum theory was incorporated into electromagnetics, and the
quantum nature of light gives rise to the field of quantum optics. Recently, even microwave
photons have been measured [23,24]. They are difficult to detect because of the low frequency
of microwave (109 Hz) compared to optics (1015 Hz): a microwave photon carries a packet of
energy about a million times smaller than that of optical photon.
The progress in nano-fabrication [25] allows one to make optical components that are
subwavelength as the wavelength of blue light is about 450 nm. As a result, interaction of
light with nano-scale optical components requires the solution of Maxwell’s equations in its
full glory.
Introduction, Maxwell’s Equations 7

In the early days of quantum theory, there were two prevailing theories of quantum in-
terpretation. Quantum measurements were found to be random. In order to explain the
probabilistic nature of quantum measurements, Einstein posited that a random hidden vari-
able controlled the outcome of an experiment. On the other hand, the Copenhagen school
of interpretation led by Niels Bohr, asserted that the outcome of a quantum measurement is
not known until after a measurement [26].
In 1960s, Bell’s theorem (by John Steward Bell) [27] said that an inequality should be
satisfied if Einstein’s hidden variable theory was correct. Otherwise, the Copenhagen school
of interpretation should prevail. However, experimental measurement showed that the in-
equality was violated, favoring the Copenhagen school of quantum interpretation [26]. This
interpretation says that a quantum state is in a linear superposition of states before a mea-
surement. But after a measurement, a quantum state collapses to the state that is measured.
This implies that quantum information can be hidden incognito in a quantum state. Hence,
a quantum particle, such as a photon, its state is unknown until after its measurement. In
other words, quantum theory is “spooky”. This leads to growing interest in quantum infor-
mation and quantum communication using photons. Quantum technology with the use of
photons, an electromagnetic quantum particle, is a subject of growing interest. This also has
the profound and beautiful implication that “our karma is not written on our forehead when
we were born, our future is in our own hands!”

1.2 Maxwell’s Equations in Integral Form

Maxwell’s equations can be presented as fundamental postulates.5 We will present them in
their integral forms, but will not belabor them until later.

d

E · dl = − B · dS Faraday’s Law (1.2.1)
C
d
dt
 S

H · dl = D · dS + I Ampere’s Law (1.2.2)

C
 dt S

D · dS = Q Gauss’s or Coulomb’s Law (1.2.3)

 S

B · dS = 0 Gauss’s Law (1.2.4)

S
The units of the basic quantities above are given as:
E: V/m H: A/m
D: C/m2 B: W/m2
I: A Q: C

where V=volts, A=amperes, C=coulombs, and W=webers.

5 Postulates in physics are similar to axioms in mathematics. They are assumptions that need not be

proved.
8 Electromagnetic Field Theory

1.3 Static Electromagnetics

1.3.1 Coulomb’s Law (Statics)
This law, developed in 1785 [28], expresses the force between two charges q1 and q2 . If these
charges are positive, the force is repulsive and it is given by
q1 q 2
f1→2 = r̂12 (1.3.1)
4πεr2

Figure 1.4: The force between two charges q1 and q2 . The force is repulsive if the two charges
have the same sign.

where the units are: f (force): newton

q (charge): coulombs
ε (permittivity): farads/meter
r (distance between q1 and q2 ): m
r̂12 = unit vector pointing from charge 1 to charge 2

r2 − r1
r̂12 = , r = |r2 − r1 | (1.3.2)
|r2 − r1 |
Since the unit vector can be defined in the above, the force between two charges can also be
rewritten as

q1 q2 (r2 − r1 )
f1→2 = , (r1 , r2 are position vectors) (1.3.3)
4πε|r2 − r1 |3

1.3.2 Electric Field E (Statics)

The electric field E is defined as the force per unit charge [29]. For two charges, one of charge
q and the other one of incremental charge ∆q, the force between the two charges, according
to Coulomb’s law (1.3.1), is

q∆q
f= r̂ (1.3.4)
4πεr2
Introduction, Maxwell’s Equations 9

where r̂ is a unit vector pointing from charge q to the incremental charge ∆q. Then the
electric field E, which is the force per unit charge, is given by

f
E= , (V/m) (1.3.5)
4q
This electric field E from a point charge q at the orgin is hence
q
E= r̂ (1.3.6)
4πεr2
Therefore, in general, the electric field E(r) at location r from a point charge q at r0 is given
by

q(r − r0 )
E(r) = (1.3.7)
4πε|r − r0 |3
where the unit vector

r − r0
r̂ = (1.3.8)
|r − r0 |

Figure 1.5: Emanating E field from an electric point charge as depicted by depicted by (1.3.7)
and (1.3.6).

If one knows E due to a point charge, one will know E due to any charge distribution
because any charge distribution can be decomposed into sum of point charges. For instance, if
10 Electromagnetic Field Theory

there are N point charges each with amplitude qi , then by the principle of linear superposition,
the total field produced by these N charges is
N
X qi (r − ri )
E(r) = (1.3.9)
i=1
4πε|r − r i |3

where qi = %(ri )∆Vi is the incremental charge at ri enclosed in the volume ∆Vi . In the
continuum limit, one gets

%(r0 )(r − r0 )
E(r) = dV (1.3.10)
V 4πε|r − r0 |3

In other words, the total field, by the principle of linear superposition, is the integral sum-
mation of the contributions from the distributed charge density %(r).
Introduction, Maxwell’s Equations 11

1.3.3 Gauss’s Law (Statics)

This law is also known as Coulomb’s law as they are closely related to each other. Apparently,
this simple law was first expressed by Joseph Louis Lagrange [30] and later, reexpressed by
Gauss in 1813 (Wikipedia).
This law can be expressed as

D · dS = Q (1.3.11)
S

where D: electric flux density with unit C/m2 and D = εE.

dS: an incremental surface at the point on S given by dS n̂ where n̂ is the unit normal
pointing outward away from the surface.
Q: total charge enclosed by the surface S.

Figure 1.6: Electric flux (courtesy of Ramo, Whinnery, and Van Duzer [31]).

The left-hand side of (1.3.11) represents a surface integral over a closed surface S. To
understand it, one can break the surface into a sum of incremental surfaces ∆Si , with a
local unit normal n̂i associated with it. The surface integral can then be approximated by a
summation
 X X
D · dS ≈ Di · n̂i ∆Si = Di · ∆Si (1.3.12)
S i i

where one has defined ∆Si = n̂i ∆Si . In the limit when ∆Si becomes infinitesimally small,
the summation becomes a surface integral.
12 Electromagnetic Field Theory

1.3.4 Derivation of Gauss’s Law from Coulomb’s Law (Statics)

From Coulomb’s law and the ensuing electric field due to a point charge, the electric flux is
q
D = εE = r̂ (1.3.13)
4πr2
When a closed spherical surface S is drawn around the point charge q, by symmetry, the
electric flux though every point of the surface is the same. Moreover, the normal vector n̂
on the surface is just r̂. Consequently, D · n̂ = D · r̂ = q/(4πr2 ), which is a constant on a
spherical of radius r. Hence, we conclude that for a point charge q, and the pertinent electric


flux D that it produces on a spherical surface,

D · dS = 4πr2 D · n̂ = 4πr2 Dr = q (1.3.14)

S
Therefore, Gauss’s law is satisfied by a point charge.

Figure 1.7: Electric flux from a point charge satisfies Gauss’s law.

Even when the shape of the spherical surface S changes from a sphere to an arbitrary
shape surface S, it can be shown that the total flux through S is still q. In other words, the
total flux through sufaces S1 and S2 in Figure 1.8 are the same.
This can be appreciated by taking a sliver of the angular sector as shown in Figure 1.9.
Here, ∆S1 and ∆S2 are two incremental surfaces intercepted by this sliver of angular sector.
The amount of flux passing through this incremental surface is given by dS · D = n̂ · D∆S =
n̂ · r̂Dr ∆S. Here, D = r̂Dr is pointing in the r̂ direction. In ∆S1 , n̂ is pointing in the r̂
direction. But in ∆S2 , the incremental area has been enlarged by that n̂ not aligned with
D. But this enlargement is compensated by n̂ · r̂. Also, ∆S2 has grown bigger, but the flux
at ∆S2 has grown weaker by the ratio of (r2 /r1 )2 . Finally, the two fluxes are equal in the
limit that the sliver of angular sector becomes infinitesimally small. This proves the assertion
that the total fluxes through S1 and S2 are equal. Since the total flux from a point charge q
through a closed surface is independent of its shape, but always equal to q, then if we have a
total charge Q which can be expressed as the sum of point charges, namely.
X
Q= qi (1.3.15)
i
Introduction, Maxwell’s Equations 13

Figure 1.8: Same amount of electric flux from a point charge passes through two surfaces S1
and S2 .

Then the total flux through a closed surface equals the total charge enclosed by it, which is
the statement of Gauss’s law or Coulomb’s law.

1.4 Homework Examples

Example 1
Field of a ring of charge of density %l C/m.
Question: What is E along z axis? Hint: Use symmetry.

Example 2
Field between coaxial cylinders of unit length.
Question: What is E?
Hint: Use symmetry and cylindrical coordinates to express E = ρ̂Eρ and appply Gauss’s law.

Example 3
Fields of a sphere of uniform charge density.
Question: What is E?
Hint: Again, use symmetry and spherical coordinates to express E = r̂Er and appply Gauss’s
law.
14 Electromagnetic Field Theory

Figure 1.9: When a sliver of angular sector is taken, same amount of electric flux from a point
charge passes through two incremental surfaces ∆S1 and ∆S2 .

Figure 1.10: Electric field of a ring of charge (courtesy of Ramo, Whinnery, and Van Duzer
[31]).

Figure 1.11: Figure for Example 2 for a coaxial cylinder.

Introduction, Maxwell’s Equations 15

Figure 1.12: Figure for Example 3 for a sphere with uniform charge density.
16 Electromagnetic Field Theory