Virtual work

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In mechanics, virtual work arises in the application of the principle of least action to the study of forces and movement of a mechanical system. The work of a force acting on a particle as it moves along a displacement is different for different displacements. Among all the possible displacements that a particle may follow, called virtual displacements, one will minimize the action. This displacement is therefore the displacement followed by the particle according to the principle of least action.

The work of a force on a particle along a virtual displacement is known as the virtual work.

Historically, virtual work and the associated calculus of variations were formulated to analyze systems of rigid bodies,^[1] but they have also been developed for the study of the mechanics of deformable bodies.^[2]