An idealized LC circuit of zero resistance can oscillate without any source of emf by shifting the energy stored in the circuit between the electric and magnetic fields. In such an LC circuit, if the capacitor contains a charge q before the switch is closed, then all the energy of the circuit is initially stored in the electric field of the capacitor. This energy is given by

When an oscillator is forced with a periodic driving force, the motion may seem chaotic. The motions of such oscillators are known as transients. After the transients die out, the oscillator reaches a steady state, where the motion is periodic, and the displacement is determined.

In the real world, oscillations seldom follow true simple harmonic motion. A system that continues its motion indefinitely without losing its amplitude is termed undamped. However, friction of some sort usually dampens the motion, so it fades away or needs more force to continue. For example, a guitar string stops oscillating a few seconds after being plucked. Similarly, one must continually push a swing to keep a child swinging on a playground.
Although friction and other non-conservative...

Stability is an important concept in oscillation. If an equilibrium point is stable, a slight disturbance of an object that is initially at the stable equilibrium point will cause the object to oscillate around that point. For an unstable equilibrium point, if the object is disturbed slightly, it will not return to the equilibrium point. There are three conditions for equilibrium points—stable, unstable, and half-stable. A half-stable equilibrium point is also unstable, but is named so...

An RLC circuit combines a resistor, inductor, and capacitor, connected in a series or parallel combination.
Consider a series RLC circuit. Here, the presence of resistance in the circuit leads to energy loss due to joule heating in the resistance. Therefore, the total electromagnetic energy in the circuit is no longer constant and decreases with time. Since the magnitude of charge, current, and potential difference continuously decreases, their oscillations are said to be damped. This is...

When one or more data points appear far from the rest of the data, there is a need to determine whether they are outliers and whether they should be eliminated from the data set to ensure an accurate representation of the measured value. In many cases, outliers arise from gross errors (or human errors) and do not accurately reflect the underlying phenomenon. In some cases, however, these apparent outliers reflect true phenomenological differences. In these cases, we can use statistical methods...