Paul's Online Notes
Paul's Online Notes
Home / Calculus III / Line Integrals / Conservative Vector Fields
Show Mobile Notice Show All Notes Hide All Notes
Mobile Notice
You appear to be on a device with a "narrow" screen width (i.e. you are probably on a mobile phone). Due to the nature of the mathematics on this site it is best views in landscape mode. If your device is not in landscape mode many of the equations will run off the side of your device (should be able to scroll to see them) and some of the menu items will be cut off due to the narrow screen width.
Assignment Problems Notice
Please do not email me to get solutions and/or answers to these problems. I will not give them out under any circumstances nor will I respond to any requests to do so. The intent of these problems is for instructors to use them for assignments and having solutions/answers easily available defeats that purpose.

If you are looking for some problems with solutions you can find some by clicking on the "Practice Problems" link above.

Section 16.6 : Conservative Vector Fields

For problems 1 – 4 determine if the vector field is conservative.

  1. \(\vec F = \left( {2x{y^3} + {{\bf{e}}^x}\cos \left( y \right)} \right)\vec i + \left( {{{\bf{e}}^x}\sin \left( y \right) - 3{x^2}{y^2}} \right)\vec j\)
  2. \(\vec F = \left( {x{y^2} - 3{y^4} + 2} \right)\vec i + \left( {x{y^2} + {x^2}{y^2} - x} \right)\vec j\)
  3. \(\displaystyle \vec F = \left( {2 + 12x{y^2} - 3{x^2}\sqrt y } \right)\vec i - \left( {\frac{{{x^3}}}{{2\sqrt y }} - 12{x^2}y} \right)\vec j\)
  4. \(\displaystyle \vec F = \left( {8 - \frac{{3{x^2}}}{y} + 5{x^4}{y^2}} \right)\vec i + \left( {6 + \frac{{{x^3}}}{{{y^2}}} - 3{y^2} + 2{x^5}y} \right)\vec j\)

For problems 5 – 11 find the potential function for the vector field.

  1. \( \displaystyle \vec F = \left( {4{x^3} + 3y + \frac{{2{y^3}}}{{{x^3}}}} \right)\vec i + \left( {3x - 3{y^2} - \frac{{3{y^2}}}{{{x^2}}}} \right)\vec j\)
  2. \(\vec F = \left( {3{x^2}{{\bf{e}}^{2y}} + 4y{{\bf{e}}^{4x}}} \right)\vec i - \left( {7 - 2{x^3}{{\bf{e}}^{2y}} - {{\bf{e}}^{4x}}} \right)\vec j\)
  3. \(\vec F = \left( {\cos \left( x \right)\cos \left( {x + y} \right) - 2{y^2} - \sin \left( x \right)\sin \left( {x + y} \right)} \right)\vec i - \left( {4xy + \sin \left( x \right)\sin \left( {x + y} \right)} \right)\vec j\)
  4. \(\displaystyle \vec F = \left( {\frac{4}{{{x^2}}} + \frac{{2x}}{y} + \frac{2}{{{x^2}{y^3}}}} \right)\vec i + \left( {\frac{6}{{x{y^4}}} - \frac{{1 + {x^2}}}{{{y^2}}}} \right)\vec j\)
  5. \(\vec F = \left( {2x{{\bf{e}}^{{x^{\,2}} - z}}\sin \left( {{y^2}} \right) - 3{y^3}} \right)\vec i + \left( {2y{{\bf{e}}^{{x^{\,2}} - z}}\cos \left( {{y^2}} \right) - 9x{y^2}} \right)\vec j + \left( {12z - {{\bf{e}}^{{x^{\,2}} - z}}\sin \left( {{y^2}} \right)} \right)\vec k\)
  6. \( \displaystyle \vec F = \left( {12x - 5{z^2}} \right)\vec i + \ln \left( {1 + {z^2}} \right)\vec j - \left( {10xz - \frac{{2yz}}{{1 + {z^2}}}} \right)\vec k\)
  7. \(\vec F = \left( {z{y^2}{{\bf{e}}^{y - x}} - x{y^2}z{{\bf{e}}^{y - x}}} \right)\vec i + \left( {2xyz{{\bf{e}}^{y - x}} + x{y^2}z{{\bf{e}}^{y - x}}} \right)\vec j + \left( {x{y^2}{{\bf{e}}^{y - x}} - 24z} \right)\vec k\)
  8. Evaluate \( \displaystyle \int\limits_{C}{{\vec F\centerdot d\vec r}}\) where \(\displaystyle \vec F\left( {x,y} \right) = \left( {\frac{{3{x^2}}}{{y - 1}} - 3{x^2}y} \right)\,\vec i + \left( {8y - {x^3} - \frac{{{x^3}}}{{{{\left( {y - 1} \right)}^2}}}} \right)\vec j\) and C is the line segment from \(\left( {1,2} \right)\) to \(\left( {4,3} \right)\).
  9. Evaluate \( \displaystyle \int\limits_{C}{{\vec F\centerdot d\vec r}}\) where \(\vec F\left( {x,y} \right) = \left( {{y^2} - 4y + 5} \right)\,\vec i + \left( {2xy - 4x - 9} \right)\vec j\) and C the upper half of \(\displaystyle \frac{{{x^2}}}{{36}} + \frac{{{y^2}}}{{16}} = 1\) with clockwise rotation.
  10. Evaluate \( \displaystyle \int\limits_{C}{{\vec F\centerdot d\vec r}}\) where \(\displaystyle \vec F\left( {x,y} \right) = - \left( {3 - \left( {1 + 2y} \right){{\bf{e}}^{x - 1}}} \right)\,\vec i + \left( {3{y^2} + 2{{\bf{e}}^{x - 1}}} \right)\vec j\) and C is the portion of \(y = {x^3} + 1\) from \(x = - 2\) to \(x = 1\).
  11. Evaluate \( \displaystyle \int\limits_{C}{{\vec F\centerdot d\vec r}}\) where \(\displaystyle \vec F\left( {x,y,z} \right) = \frac{x}{{\sqrt {{x^2} + {z^2}} }}\,\vec i + \left( {2yz - 6y} \right)\vec j + \left( {{y^2} + \frac{z}{{\sqrt {{x^2} + {z^2}} }}} \right)\vec k\) and C is the line segment from \(\left( {1,0, - 1} \right)\) to \(\left( {2, - 4,3} \right)\).
  12. Evaluate \( \displaystyle \int\limits_{C}{{\vec F\centerdot d\vec r}}\) where \(\vec F\left( {x,y,z} \right) = \left( {12xy - 2x} \right)\,\vec i + \left( {6{x^2} - 8yz} \right)\vec j + \left( {8 - 4{y^2}} \right)\vec k\) and C is the spiral given by \(\vec r\left( t \right) = \left\langle {\sin \left( {\pi t} \right),\cos \left( {\pi t} \right),3t} \right\rangle \) for \(0 \le t \le 6\).
  13. Evaluate \( \displaystyle \int\limits_{C}{{\vec F\centerdot d\vec r}}\) where \(\vec F\left( {x,y} \right) = \left( {8 - 14x{y^2} + 2y{{\bf{e}}^{2x}}} \right)\,\vec i + \left( {{{\bf{e}}^{2x}} - 14{x^2}y} \right)\vec j\) and C is the curve shown below.
    This curve has three line segments in it.  The first line segment starts at (-1,2) and ends at the origin.  The second line segment starts at the origin and ends at (2,1).  The final line segment starts at (2,1) and ends at (4,-2).
  14. Evaluate \( \displaystyle \int\limits_{C}{{\vec F\centerdot d\vec r}}\) where \(\vec F\left( {x,y} \right) = \left( {6x - 5{y^2} + 2x{y^3} - 10} \right)\,\vec i + \left( {3{x^2}{y^2} - 10xy} \right)\vec j\) and C is the curve shown below.
    This curve starts with the upper half of the circle of radius 1 centered at the origin with clockwise rotation (i.e. starts at (-1,0) and ends at (1,0)).  It is followed by the portion of $y=\sin(\pi x)$ starting at (1,0) and ending at (2,0).  The final portion of the curve is the lower half of the circle given by ${{\left( x-3 \right)}^{2}}+{{y}^{2}}=1$ with counter clockwise rotation (i.e. starts at (2,0) and ends at (4,0)).