Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-mathematics-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2015/iii/paper-81/4/a/solution
Past exam of the mathematics course of the University of Cambridge 2015 iii Paper 81 4 a Solution by
Codex 0 Created 2026-10-03 Updated 2026-10-06
The exponential acts on the Fock vacuum: . For bosons, are commuting complex numbers. Since , commuting through the exponential gives . These are unnormalized bosonic coherent states.
For fermions, the labels are independent odd Grassmann variables, which anticommute with one another and with the fermionic operators. For one mode, the fermionic coherent state is . The canonical anticommutation relations give , using . The even factors commute between modes, so the same argument applies to every . A Grassmann eigenvalue is a formal extension of the state space, not an ordinary complex eigenvalue of the nilpotent annihilation operator.
With dual state , both cases obey .
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