A note on Newtonian, Lagrangian and Hamiltonian dynamical systems in Riemannian manifolds

Abstract

Newtonian, Lagrangian, and Hamiltonian dynamical systems are well formalized mathematically. They give rise to geometric structures describing motion of a point in smooth manifolds. Riemannian metric is a different geometric structure formalizing concepts of length and angle. The interplay of Riemannian metric and its metric connection with mechanical structures produces some features which are absent in the case of general (non-Riemannian) manifolds. The aim of present paper is to discuss these features and develop special language for describing Newtonian, Lagrangian, and Hamiltonian dynamical systems in Riemannian manifolds.