Applications of the calculus of variations

Applications of the calculus of variations include:

• Solutions to the brachistochrone problem, tautochrone problem, catenary problem, and Newton's minimal resistance problem;
• Finding minimal surfaces of a given boundary, or solving Plateau's problem;

• Analytical mechanics, or reformulations of Newton's laws of motion, most notably Lagrangian and Hamiltonian mechanics;
• Geometric optics, especially Lagrangian and Hamiltonian optics;

• Variational method (quantum mechanics), one way of finding approximations to the lowest energy eigenstate or ground state, and some excited states;
• Variational Bayesian methods, a family of techniques for approximating intractable integrals arising in Bayesian inference and machine learning;
• Variational methods in general relativity, a family of techniques using calculus of variations to solve problems in Einstein's general theory of relativity;
• Finite element method is a variational method for finding numerical solutions to boundary-value problems in differential equations;

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