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X.B.3 Rotation of a coordinate system

A transformation of coordinate systems commonly done is a rotation of the coordinate system around a specified axis passing through the origin of the coordinate system. The resulting coordinate system has the same origin, but its base vectors are modified. A classical use of this operation corresponds to the transformation of vector or tensor results in material, ply or element axes of 2D elements.

For example, let v be a unit vector defining the rotation axis and θ the rotation angle. Then the three transformed base vectors are given by:

ei′ = cos ⁡ θe i + (1 - cos ⁡ θ)(v⋅ei)v + sin ⁡ θ(v×ei).
(X.B.1)

In particular, if v corresponds to e3, the three

e1′ = cos ⁡ θe 1 + (1 - cos ⁡ θ)(e3 ⋅e1)e3 + sin ⁡ θ(e3 ×e1), = cos ⁡ θe1 + sin ⁡ θ(e2), = cos ⁡ θe1 + sin ⁡ θe2.

e2′ = cos ⁡ θe 2 + (1 - cos ⁡ θ)(e3 ⋅e2)e3 + sin ⁡ θ(e3 ×e2), = cos ⁡ θe2 + sin ⁡ θ(-e1), = cos ⁡ θe2 - sin ⁡ θe1. e3′ = cos ⁡ θe 3 + (1 - cos ⁡ θ)(e3 ⋅e3)e3 + sin ⁡ θ(e3 ×e3), = cos ⁡ θe3 + (1 - cos ⁡ θ)(1)e3, = e3.