Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-differential-equations-2-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2021/1/b/i/solution

For , use variation of parameters with the homogeneous solutions , whose Wronskian is one. Write and impose . The differential equation gives , hence
After integrating from zero and using the left boundary condition,
The right boundary condition determines
so the unique solution is
Combining the two integrals gives , with Green's function
It is symmetric in , as expected from self-adjointness, and has zero endpoint values. At it is continuous, while its first derivative obeys the jump condition
Thus , with the positive normalization of the Dirac delta function required for .

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