Q7.33 Separation of Motion of a system of particles into the motion of the centre of mass and motion about the
centre of mass :
(b) show
where is the total kinetic energy of the system of particles, is the total kinetic energy of the
system when the particle velocities are taken with respect to the centre of mass and is the
kinetic energy of the translation of the system as a whole (i.e. of the centre of mass motion of the
system). The result has been used in Sec. 7.14.
From the first part we can write :
or
Squaring both sides (in vector form taking dot products with itself), we get :
or
or
Hence