Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2013/ia/paper-3/4c/solution

For a continuously differentiable vector field on all of , the necessary and sufficient condition for a conservative vector field is . Necessity follows from equality of mixed partial derivatives of a potential; sufficiency uses the being a simply connected space. On a general domain the topology cannot be omitted.
Here the relevant mixed partial derivatives are
Thus the curl vanishes. Integrating the first component in gives . Matching the second component gives , hence . Matching the last component forces . A potential of a conservative vector field with the convention is consequently
If a physical potential is defined instead through , it is .

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